NiV^SI'PY  (JF^QALIFORI^IA. 


Tim  Sl^SH  CfttLtClWOX  OF  THK  SEMITIC   LIBKAKV 
nl    THf    I  MVKRSITYHF  CALIfOKMA. 


i  ours  SLO:5b. 

FfBRUARV.   1897. 

s^ion  iSlo.b  tD6  /    •     ^V./.ss  A. 


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in  2007  with  funding  from 

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littp://www.archive.org/details/earlyreligionofiOOroberich 


THE 


EARLY  EELIGION  OF  ISRAEL 


AS   SET   FORTH   BY  BIBLICAL  WRITERS  AND   BY 
MODERN    CRITICAL   HISTORIANS 


Ci}e  Bairtr  iLecture  for  1889 


BY 


JAMES    EOBERTSON,  D.D. 

PROFESSOR   OF  ORIENTAL   LAKOUAOE3  IN  THE   tTNIVEHSITY 
OF   GLASGOW 


ECOND     EDITION 


'^^\\*^^S^ 


NEW  YORK 
ANSON  D.  F.  KANDOLPH  AND  CO. 

EDINBUKaH    AND    LONDON 

WILLIAM    BLACKWOOD    AND    SONS 

MDCCCXCII 


All  Rights  reserved 


t<\\^^ 


\ 


tf^^ 


^t^^f 


PEEFACE  TO  THE  SECOND  EDITION. 


The  first  impression  of  this  book  has  been  exhausted  much 
sooner  than  I  had  anticipated.  It  would  be  premature 
to  refer  at  length  to  the  strictures  of  critics  while  the 
work  is  still  under  review;  and,  since  any  value  that  it 
may  possess  lies  rather  in  the  main  argument  presented 
than  in  the  exhibition  of  details,  I  have  judged  it  ex- 
pedient to  allow  it  to  reappear  in  its  original  form, 
although  I  am  well  aware  how  much  it  admits  of  im- 
provement. 

I  have  no  reason  to  complain  of  the  criticisms  the  book 
has  hitherto  received.  Some  of  them  have  been  far  too 
laudatory ;  and  for  the  more  adverse  I  was  already  pre- 
pared. 

It  may  not  be  out  of  place  to  remind  readers  that  I  am 
not  to  be  held  as  committed  to  all  the  views  which,  for 
the  purpose  of  the  discussion,  are  provisionally  not  dis- 
puted, or  as  considering  certain  lines  of  argument  to  be 
applicable  only  to  the  extent  that  they  are  here  applied. 


vi  Preface  to  the.  Second  Edition, 

The  aim  of  the  book  is  not  to  vindicate  any  distinct  place 
for  the  writer,  but  to  stimulate  the  intelligent  reader  to 
think  for  himself;  for  I  still  believe  that  such  a  reader, 
though  neither  a  Hebraist  nor  a  trained  critic,  is  quite 
competent  to  judge  fairly  on  the  main  points  of  the 
argument  which  is  here  presented. 


September  1892. 


PEEFACE  TO  THE  FIEST  EDITION. 


The  substance  of  the  following  pages  was  delivered  as  the 
Baird  Lecture  in  the  spring  of  1889.  A  good  deal  of 
matter  is  here  presented  which  could  not  find  expression 
within  the  limits  of  six  lectures ;  and  a  division  into 
chapters  was  found  more  convenient  for  the  treatment 
of  the  different  parts.  The  delay  in  publication  has  been 
occasioned,  partly  by  the  occupations  of  a  somewhat 
laborious  office,  partly  by  broken  health,  which  allowed 
me  to  take  up  the  work  only  at  long  intervals.  But,  in- 
deed, for  other  reasons  I  have  not  been  forward  to  lay  my 
views  before  the  public.  I  am  quite  well  aware  how  the 
current  of  opinion  on  Old  Testament  subjects  is  running ; 
and  I  am  not  insensible  to  the  fact  that,  while  some  may 
find  fault  with  me  for  giving  up  received  views,  a  greater 
number,  and  some  who  are  younger  than  I,  will  "have 
me  in  derision  "  for  not  being  abreast  of  the  age. 

Nevertheless,  one  must  be  fully  persuaded  in  his  own 
mind.     I  have  long  been  convinced  that  the  substantial 


viii  Preface  to  the  First  Edition. 

value  of  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament  _dpes  not  depend 
u£on_our  knowing  their  authorship ;  and  I  doubt  whether 
we  can  ever  accurately  determine  the  circumstances  of 
their  composition.  At  the  same  time  I  am  as  firmly 
convinced  that,  in  critical  discussions  on  the  Old  Testa- 
ment as  these  have  been  conducted,  there  is  much  more 
involved  than  the  dates  of  books  and  the  literary  modes 
of  their  composition.  Whatever  may  be  said  of  the  "  tra- 
ditional view  "  on  these  subjects,  it  is  to  be  remembered 
that  the  ''  traditional  view  "  of  the  history  of  thereligion 
is  the  view  of  the  Biblical  writers ;  and  if  it  is  declared 
tcT  be  incorrect,  our  estimate  of  the  value  of  the  books 
must  be  considerably  modified.  It  is  this  aspect  of  the 
critical  inquiry  that  has  chiefly  engaged  my  attention.  I 
have  patiently  and  honestly  tried  to  understand  the  posi- 
tion of  critical  writers,  to  follow  the  processes  and  to 
grasp  the  principles  on  which  the  historical  inquiries 
have  been  conducted.  But  I  find  myself  like  one  stand- 
ing by  the  side  of  a  Highland  stream,  while  another  more 
nimble  goes  over  on  improvised  stepping-stones.  He  gets 
over,  apparently  dry-shod ;  but  I  cannot  follow  him,  be- 
cause the  stepping-stones  have  been  submerged  by  his 
weight.  I  look  in  vain  to  the  critics  for  a  passable  road, 
with  a  firm  bottom,  which  a  man  of  plain  understanding 
may  tread.  Many,  no  doubt,  will  call  me  unreasonable 
or  stupid ;  but  it  may  happen  that  not  a  few  others  are 
as  dull  as  myself,  if  they  would  care  to  own  it. 

"Conservatism,"  it   has   been   said,^  "is   the   habitual 
attitude  of  Orientals."      One   poor  orientalist  here  and 

^  Robertson  Smith,  Religion  of  the  Semites,  first  series,  p.  4. 


Preface  to  the  First  Edition.  ix 

there  may  be  pardoned  for  having  so  much  in  common 
with  them,  when  so  many  scholars  are  of  another  mind. 
I  may  plead,  as  a  special  excuse  for  my  sympathy,  the 
fact  that  I  spent  some  dozen  years — the  years  of  life  also 
during  which  one  receives  the  most  lasting  impressions 
— in  familiar  intercourse  with  Orientals  on  the  very  bor- 
ders of  Palestine,  where  it  would  have  been  easy,  so  to 
speak,  to  get  models  for  Old  Testament  portraits.  When 
I  found  simple,  unlettered  people,  with  crude  enough 
moralities  and  no  lack  of  superstition,  reasoning  and 
talking  like  Old  Testament  characters,  drawing  the 
widest  generalisations  from  the  smallest  incidents,  and 
withal  carrying  about  a  habit  of  religion  that  commanded 
reverence,  it  never  occurred  to  me  to  explain  similar 
combinations  or  inconsistencies  in  Old  Testament  char- 
acters by  contradictory  traditions ;  nor  did  it  seem  at  all 
incredible  that  a  high  tone  of  religious  conception  should 
be  found  in  what  might  appear  a  primitive  and  rude  age. 
In  reading  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures,  I  seemed  to  be 
holding  converse  w^ith  living  men ;  and  I  came  to  the 
conclusion  that  the  best  way  to  understand  a  book  is  to 
be  in  sympathy  with  the  man  that  wrote  it. 

My  interest  in  the  subject,  therefore,  is  not  primarily 
of  a  dogmatic  or  theological  character.  I  am  less  con- 
cerned to  defend  a  theory  than  to  claim  for  the  Biblical 
writers — what  I  think  they  have  not  received — fair  play. 
On  both  sides  of  the  controversy,  the  books  have  been 
wrangled  over,  as  if  they  had  been  some  legal  deed  or 
Act  of  Parliament,  while  the  personality  of  the  writers 
has  been  left  out  of  view.     I  am  not  opposed  to  criti- 


X  Preface  to  the  First  Edition. 

cism,  although  I  am  free  to  confess  I  do  not  acknowledge 
Criticism  in  the  sense  in  which  it  is  sometimes  spoken  of, 
as  if  it  were  some  infallible  science.  But  I  plead  for  a 
criticism  of  a  saner  sort,  such  as  we  should  employ  in 
the  ordinary  intercourse  of  life  or  apply  to  a  modern 
author ;  a  criticism  that  shall  start  by  admitting  that  the 
writer  possesses  ordinary  intelligence,  and  knows  fairly 
well  what  he  is  writing  about ;  that  shall  then  interpret 
his  words  in  a  fair  and  common-sense  fashion,  and  be 
bold  enough,  when  necessary,  to  confess  its  own  igno- 
rance. If  some  things  should  be  found  in  these  pages 
indicating  that  I  am  incapable  of  following  a  critical 
argument  as  these  arguments  are  conducted,  they  will  at 
least  be  of  some  service  if  they  stir  up  the  unwary  reader 
to  examine  the  foundations  of  the  arguments  for  himself. 
What  is  scepticism  in  one  age  becomes  credulity  in  the 
next.  The  critical  theory  is  fast  becoming  "traditional,"! 
and  is  being  accepted  by  multitudes  on  no  better  grounds! 
than  those  on  which  the  former  view  became  traditional/ 
It  is  now  high  time  to  apply  scepticism  to  the  prevailing] 
theory,  so  that  the  strength  or  weakness  of  its  foundations 
may  be  made  manifest. 

After  all  the  following  chapters  and  most  of  the  notes 
were  in  type,  Professor  Driver's  important  'Introduction  to 
the  Literature  of  the  Old  Testament '  appeared.  Though 
he  does  not  profess  to  deal  with  the  history,  and  it  was 
no  part  of  my  design  to  treat  of  the  structure  of  the 
books,  yet  the  two  lines  of  inquiry  touch  one  another  at 
certain  points.  I  thought  it  better,  however,  to  reserve 
for  this  place  a  brief  reference  to  his  work,  and  not  to 


Preface,  to  the  First  Edition.  xi 

modify  what  I  had  already  written  before  I  had  an 
opportunity  of  seeing  his  conclusions.  These  conclusions, 
I  may  be  allowed  to  say,  are  arrived  at  by  a  method  that 
is  admirable  for  its  fairness  in  the  treatment  of  details, 
and  its  cautious  reserve  in  face  of  doubtful  or  conflicting 
evidence.  So  far  as  they  relate  to  the  composition  and 
dates  of  the  books,  I  am  not  particularly  concerned  with 
them ;  but  I  note  with  no  little  satisfaction  statements 
in  various  connections  which  I  take  as  indications  that, 
both  on  this  subject  and  in  regard  to  the  history  of  the 
religion,  he  holds  much  more  moderate  views  than  those 
of  the  prevailing  school  of  critics.  Thus,  for  example,  he 
says:  "The  date  at  which  an  event,  or  institution,  is  first 
mentioned  in  writing  must  not  be  confused  with  that  at 
which  it  occurred,  or  originated  "  (p.  118);  and  again — 
"  The  phraseology  of  P,  it  is  natural  to  suppose,  is  one 
which  had  gradually  formed ;  hence  it  contains  elements 
which  are  no  doubt  ancient  side  by  side  with  those  which 
were  introduced  later,"  &c.  (p.  148),  So,  while  con- 
cluding that  "  the  completed  Priests'  Code  is  the  work  of 
the  age  subsequent  to  Ezekiel,"  he  is  careful  to  add  the 
^qualification  that  "the  chief  ceremonial  institutions  of 
jlsrael  are  in  their  origin  of  great  antiquity"  (p.  135). 
Whether  he  would  include  in  this  category  as  many 
institutions  as  Konig  accepts,^  I  cannot  gather.  It  would, 
however,  have  been  more  satisfactory  had  both  these 
critics  indicated  precisely  on  what  evidence  they  rest 
their  conclusions — evidence  that  would  stand  the  test  of 
such  a  rigorous  criticism  as  they  allow  on  other  matters. 
1  See  below,  Note  XXIX.  p.  517  f. 


xii  Preface  to  the  First  Edition. 

Statements  such  as  those  I  have  quoted  amount,  in  my 
opinion,  to  a  set  of  critical  canons  quite  different  from 
those  of  Wellhausen ;  and  Dr  Driver  would  have  been  no 
more  than  just  to  himself  if  he  had  (as  Konig  has  done) 
accentuated  the  difference. 

Some  other  points,  referred  to  in  Professor  Driver's 
Preface,  will  be  found  touched  upon  in  the  following 
pages.  Thus  I  have  "  admitted  that  traditions  are  col- 
oured to  some  extent  by  the  age  in  which  they  find 
literary  expression"  (below,  p.  128;  of.  p.  424);  and  on 
the  literary  habit  of  placing  speeches  in  the  mouths  of 
historical  characters,  I  have  stated  my  views  at  some 
length  (chap,  xvi.)  I  still  adhere,  however,  after  reading 
his  remark  (Pref.,  p.  xvii),  to  what  I  have  said  in  regard 
to  the  topographical  acciyacy  of  the  Old  Testament 
writers  (p.  97  ff.),  and  think  that  the  case  might  even 
be  put  more  strongly. 

To  one  other  point  touched  upon  in  Professor  Driver's 
Preface  I  feel  constrained  to  refer— the  relation  of  modern 
criticism  of  the  Old  Testament  to  the  authority  of  the 
New  Testament,  and  to  the  subject  of  inspiration.  Were 
there  nothing  in  dispute  but  the  dates  of  books,  the  matter 
might  be  allowed  to  rest  as  he  states  it  (p.  xviii) ;  but  a 
much  more  serious  issue  has  to  be  faced  than  the  question 
what  our  Lord  would  have  said  had  He  been  asked  about 
the  authorship  of  certain  books.  Without  putting  a  hypo- 
thetical case  as  to  what  He  would  have  said,  I  would  ask 
the  direct  question.  Whether  the  relation  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment to  the  Old  would  be  the  same — whether  Christianity, 
as  a  historically  developed   religion,  would  have '  equal 


Preface  to  the  First  Edition.  xiii 

value  to  us — if,  eg,,  Abraham  be  "a  free  creation  of  un- 
conscious art,"  and  a  great  part  of  the  narratives  of  the 
Hexateuch  "the  fruit  solely  of  late  Jewish  fancy,"  and 
if  there  be  "  not  a  particle  of  truth  in  the  whole  narrative  " 
of  something  else  ?  It  is  altogether  inadequate  to  reply  to 
such  a  question,  tliat  "  criticism  in  the  hands  of  Christian 
scholars  does  not  banish  or  destroy  the  inspiration  of  the 
Old  Testament ;  it  presupposes  it "  (Pref.,  p.  xix).  Such 
scholars  would  do  an  invaluable  service  to  the  Church  at 
the  present  time  if  they  would  explain  what  they  mean  by 
inspiration  in  this  connection,  and  define  wherein  their  posi- 
tion differs  from  that  of  critics  who  profess  no  such  rever- 
ence for  the  Old  Testament,  I  can  quite  well  understand 
the  position  of  one  who  should  say  it  does  not  matter 
whether  the  Old  Testament  story  is  true  or  not,  provided 
we  can  draw  from  it  good  religious  instruction.  So  in  a 
certain  sense  one  might  call  the  religious  novel  inspired 
Scripture.  But  the  Christian  scholar  must  be  prepared  to 
meet  the  objector  who  insists  on  meting  out  the  same 
measure  to  the  New  Testament  writers;  for,  in  spite  of 
what  Professor  Driver  says  (p.  xvii),  we  are  dependent  upon 
the  evangelists  for  the  picture  of  the  Christ,  and,  in  the 
field  of  Old  Testament  history,  critics  find  room  for  great 
*'  modifications  of  tradition "  within  the  space  of  half  a 
century,  not  to  say  more.  So  it  is  quite  inadequate  to  the 
case  when  Horton,  speaking  of  the  Law  and  Christ's  refer- 
ences to  it,  says,^  "Now,  supposing  the  book  had  been 
compiled  actually  by  His  contemporaries,  this  practical 
value  of  it  would  remain  just  what  it  is."    For  the  question 

*  Inspiration  and  the  Bible,  p.  179. 


xiv  Preface  to  the  First  Edition. 

recurs,  Would  the  historical  value  of  Christianity  remain 
just  what  it  is  ? 

I  have  a  strong  conviction  that  it  is  their  connection 
with  a  divinely  guided  history,  more  even  than  their  high 
tone  of  teaching,  that  gives  to  the  Old  Testament  books 
their  special  authority ;  and  for  this  reason  I  regard  it  as 
most  important  to  determine  what  the  movement  and 
character  of  the  history  were.  Professor  Briggs  tells  us  ^ 
that  the  higher  criticism  can  never  determine  whether  the 
writings  contain  the  Divine  Word ;  but  I  think  that,  in- 
ferentially  at  least,  it  can.  I  believe  a  sober  and  un- 
prejudiced criticism  will  show  that  Israel,  at  the  dawn  of 
its  national  existence,  had  a  very  exalted  conception  of 
God  and  a  high  rule  of  duty,  and  that  these  things  were 
neither  borrowed  from  their  neighbours  jiorjxcogitated  by  / 
themselves.  If  the  inference  is  legitimate  that  they  must 
have  come  "  from  above,"  then  the  writings  which  exhibit 
the  process  of  this  revelation  contain  no  "  cunningly  de- 
vised fable,"  but  have  from  their  connection  a  divine 
character.  Criticism,  as  an  exercise  of  human  reason, 
having  come  so  far,  may  reverently  give  place  to  another 
faculty  with  a  nobler  name,  by  which  divine  things  are 
"  spiritually  discerned  "  (1  Cor.  ii.  14). 

1  Biblical  Studj,  p.  220, 


''AU 


CONTENTS. 


ClIKF.  rxoR 

INTRODUCTION, 1 

I.    THE   RELIGIOUS  CHARACTER   OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  ISRAEL,      11 

II.   TWO  CONTENDING  THEORIES  OF  THE   HISTORY,      .  .  27 

III.  WRITINGS   OP  THE   NINTH   AND  EIGHTH  CENTURIES  B.C. 

AS   LITERARY  AND   AS   RELIGIOUS   PRODUCTS,      .  .  50 

IV.  THE    "  EARLIER   PROPHETS,"  ......  74 

V.   TESTIMONY   OP  THE   NINTH  AND   EIGHTH  CENTURIES  TO 

THE   ANTECEDENT  HISTORY, 106 

VI.   THE   KEY  OF   THE   CRITICAL   POSITION,  .           .           .           .136 
VII.    PRE-PROPHETIC   RELIGION — NAMING   OP  THE   DEITY,      .         167 
VIII.   PRE-PROPHETIC  RELIGION  CONTINUED — THE  DWELLING- 
PLACE   OP   THE  DEITY, 192 

IX.    PRE-PROPHETIC    RELIGION    CONTINUED  —  VISIBLE   REP- 
RESENTATIONS  OP   THE   DEITY, 215 

X.   PRE-PROPHETIC    RELIGION    CONTINUED  :    MOLOCH- WOR- 
SHIP— HUMAN   SACRIFICES — FIRE-WORSHIP,         .           .241 
XI.   THE   JAHAVEH   RELIGION, 266 


xvi  Contents. 

XII.    ETHIC   MONOTHEISM, 296 

XIII.  AUTHORITATIVE   INSTITUTIONS — THEIR   EARLY   DATE,     .  326 

XIV.  AUTHORITATIVE  INSTITUTIONS — THEIR  RELIGIOUS  BASIS,  353 
XV.   THE   THREE   CODES, 381 

XVL    THE   LAW-BOOKS, 414 

XVIL   LAW   AND   PROPHECY, 440 

XVIII.  CONCLUSION,  .           r 464 

NOTES, 493 

INDEX. 521 


EARLY  EELIGION  OF  ISEAEL. 


INTEODUCTION. 

Attitude  of  the  reader  of  the  English  Bible  to  recent  critical  studies  of  the 
Old  Testament — Preliminary  difficulties  of  a  technical  kind — Attempt 
to  present  the  argument  in  a  new  form —  The  fundamental  matters  in 
dispute  are  not  questions  of  scholarship — The  temptations  of  specialists 
— The  final  appeal  must  he  to  intelligent  common-sense. 

Within  recent  years  there  lias  been  such  an  advance  in 
the  critical  study  of  the  Old  Testament  that  a  perceptible 
change  has  taken  place  in  the  attitude  of  ordinary  read- 
ers toward  the  whole  subject.  So  long  as  the  matters 
in  dispute  were  questions  as  to  the  age,  authorship,  and 
mode  of  composition  of  certain  books,  particularly  of  the 
Pentateuch,  and  these  subjects  were  handled  simply  or 
mainly  as  matters  of  technical  criticism,  the  general  reader, 
if  he  did  not  altogether  abjure  "  unsettling "  discussions, 
was  perplexed  by  inquiries  demanding  special  skill  and 
training  for  their  prosecution,  or  took  little  interest  in 
problems  which  appeared  to  admit  of  the  most  diverse 
solutions.     But  since  a  thorough-going  theory  was  adopted 

A 


2  Introduction. 

by  prominent  critical  writers,  and  especially  since  it  was 
applied  in  the  formal  exhibition  of  the  history  of  Israel 
from  a  new  standpoint,  the  whole  subject  of  Old  Testa- 
ment criticism  has  assumed  a  more  pressing  interest  for 
the  ordinary  reader.  The  question  of  the  history  of  books 
gives  place  to  an  inquiry  into  the  history  of  a  people; 
and  the  uninitiated  reader  is  called  upon,  if  not  to 
determine  the  manner  in  which  certain  documents  were 
composed,  to  pronounce  an  opinion  upon  the  value  of 
these  documents  as  materials  for  understanding  the  course 
of  Israel's  religious  history.  Those  who  have  made  a 
special  study  of  these  matters  have  reached  a  stage  at 
which  they  can  exhibit  the  results  of  their  investigations 
as  a  completed  whole,  and  challenge  the  assent  of  others 
who  have  not  the  ability  or  the  leisure  to  follow  tlie 
processes  for  themselves.  Dr  Eobertson  Smith,  in  his 
preface  to  the  English  edition  of  Wellhausen's  'Prole- 
gomena to  the  History  of  Israel '  (p.  viii),  says :  "  In  this 
as  in  other  sciences,  when  the  truth  has  been  reached, 
it  can  generally  be  presented  in  a  comparatively  simple 
form,  and  the  main  positions  can  be  justified  even  to  the 
general  reader  by  methods  much  less  complicated,  and 
much  more  lucid,  than  those  originally  followed  by  the 
investigators  themselves."  The  same  writer,  while  insist- 
ing on  the  fact  that  the  matters  with  which  Professor 
Wellhausen  deals  "  are  such  as  no  intelligent  student  of 
the  Old  Testament  can  afford  to  neglect,"  claims  (p.  vi) 
that  the  book  referred  to  "  gives  the  English  reader,  for 
the  first  time,  an  opportunity  to  form  his  own  judgment 
on  questions  which  are  within  the  scope  of  any  one  who 
reads  the  English  Bible  carefully,  and  is  able  to  think 
clearly  and  without  prejudice  about  its  contents." 

To  what  extent  English  readers  have  without  prejudice 


Preliminary  DljJicuUies.  3 

formed  their  own  opinions  on  tlie  matters  in  dispute  it 
would  be  hard  to  say.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  not 
a  few,  while  disclaiming  all  pretensions  of  being  able 
to  appreciate  the  technical  critical  arguments  on  which 
Wellhausen  proceeds,  profess  themselves  satisfied  in  their 
own  minds  that  the  scheme  of  Israel's  history  which  he 
presents  is  in  the  main  correct.  Others,  not  prepared  to 
go  so  far,  have  a  general  feeling  that  some  reconstruction 
of  the  received  views  is  needed ;  while  others  again,  who 
have  made  some  attempt  to  follow  the  arguments,  are 
unable  to  come  to  any  decision.  It  would  not  be  fair  to 
class  all  who  accept  the  new  theory  among  those  "  clever 
superficial  men  and  women  who  think  that  everything 
has  been  found  out,  when  next  to  nothing  has  been 
found  out  at  all,  who  disbelieve  in  Authority,  and  do 
believe  in  '  authorities.' "  ^  Yet  perhaps  the  main  reason 
for  the  ready  assent  on  the  part  of  some,  and  the  hesi- 
tancy on  that  of  others,  is  the  fact  that  these  investiga- 
tions have  been  pursued  by  skilled  Hebraists  and  critics, 
who  are  naturally  supposed  to  have  special  means  of 
determining  the  delicate  questions  involved.  The  results 
are  set  forth  with  such  an  array  of  learning  and  with 
so  much  confidence  that  the  one  class  of  readers  give 
deference  to  authorities  wdiom  they  take  to  be  compe- 
tent, while  the  other  class  decline  to  assent  to  a  process 
of  reasoning  which  they  themselves  are  incapable  of 
following. 

Tor,  notwithstanding  the  appeal  to  the  ordinary  reader 
of  the  English  Bible,  a  great  deal  of  preliminary  investiga- 
tion must  have  taken  place  before  that  point  is  reached  at 
which  such  a  reader  is  able  to  follow  the  critic ;  and  much 
has  to  be  taken  as  proved,  because  the  process  of  argumenta- 

*  Andrew  Lang  in  'New  Review,'  August  1889. 


4  Introduction, 

tion  is  too  intricate  for  those  vvlio  are  not  specialists  in  tliis 
department  of  inquiry.  T]ie  English  reader,  on  taking  up, 
for  example,  Wellhausen's  book,  comes  upon  a  statement 
like  this :  "  The  assumptions  I  make  will  find  an  ever- 
recurring  justification  in  the  course  of  the  investigation ; 
the  two  principal  are,  that  the  work  of  the  Jehovist,  as  far 
as  the  nucleus  of  it  is  concerned,  belongs  to  the  course  of 
the  Assyrian  period,  and  that  Deuteronomy  belongs  to  its 
close."  ^  Moreover,  he  finds  himself  on  almost  every  page 
confronted  with  statements  as  to  earlier  and  later  elements 
of  the  same  document,  and  assertions  as  to  interpolations 
and  later  revisions;  and  he  naturally  concludes  that  it 
is  from  linguistic  peculiarities  and  by  purely  scholarly 
processes  that  such  distinctions  are  made.  There  is  a 
continual  assumption  of  something  which  the  reader  has 
been  no  party  in  establishing,  a  building  upon  foundations 
which  are  underground.  Whether  the  assumptions  are 
supported  by  arguments  to  which  he  would  yield,  whether 
the  foundations  are  securely  laid,  he  does  not  know.  He 
must  therefore  either  surrender  himself  to  his  critical 
guides,  or  get  perplexed  over  the  mass  of  intricate 
details. 

It  would  manifestly  be  an  advantage  if  the  subject  could 
be  treated  in  such  a  way  that  the  ordinary  reader  would, 
from  the  first,  be  able  to  appreciate  the  arguments  em- 
ployed. Since  it  is  he  who  is  called  upon  to  give  his 
verdict,  he  ought  to  have  some  firm  ground  on  which  to 
stand,  some  standard  to  which  to  appeal.  If  certain 
critical  processes  are  necessary,  those  critical  canons  at 
least  which  control  the  processes  should  be  distinctly  laid 

1  Prolegomena  to  the  History  of  Israel,  p.  13.  For  brevity,  the  Eng- 
lish translation  of  this  work  is  in  the  sequel  referred  to  as  Wellhausen's 
'  History  of  Israel.' 


Mode  of  a2'>proaching  the  Subject.  5 

down  and  accepted  as  valid.  If  certain  books,  or  portions 
of  books,  for  example,  are  rejected  as  unliistorical  and 
untrustworthy,  or  if  certain  passages  are  declared  to  be 
interpolations  or  additions,  the  ordinary  reader  ought  to 
be  satisfied  on  what  grounds  this  critical  sifting  is  exer- 
cised. If  he  is  told  that  this  is  done  on  scholarly  grounds, 
of  whose  validity  he  is  incapable  of  forming  an  opinion, 
it  comes  to  this,  that  the  advocate  of  the  theory  consti- 
tutes himself  the  judge  also,  and  there  is  no  case  for  the 
jury.  But  it  may  turn  out  that  the  critical  processes  in 
question  are  controlled  by  canons  of  whose  validity  the 
ordinary  reader  is  quite  competent  to  judge.  Either, 
therefore,  the  processes  themselves  and  the  conclusions 
drawn  from  them  must  be  entirely  left  aside  at  the 
outset,  or  else  they  must  be  able  to  justify  themselves 
to  the  plain  reason  of  the  ordinary  reader.  It  is  the 
advocate's  aim  to  maintain  his  thesis,  but  it  is  the  duty 
of  the  jury  to  see  that  it  is  sustained  on  proper  evidence. 
The  appeal  to  the  ordinary  reader  is  nugatory  unless  he 
is  put  in  possession  of  a  standard  by  which  to  judge. 

In  the  following  chapters  an  attempt  is  made  to  ap- 
proach the  subject  in  such  a  manner  that  an  intelligent 
reader  of  the  English  Bible  may  not  be  placed  at  a  dis- 
advantage, and  to  present  the  questions  in  dispute  in 
such  a  shape  that  he  will  be  able  from  the  first  to  follow 
the  argument.  This  of  course  implies  starting  from  neu- 
tral and  undisputed  ground.  The  reader  must  be  pre- 
pared to  hold  in  abeyance  any  prepossessions  to  which 
he  may  have  been  accustomed :  if  he  is  not  to  defer  to 
"  authorities,"  neither  must  he  rely  on  bare  "  Authority." 
And  there  are  certain  circumstances  favourable  to  such  a 
mode  of  procedure  at  the  present  time.  For  one  thing, 
the  heat  of  controversy  in  regard  to  many  points  in  dis- 


6  Introduction, 

pute  has  so  far  subsided  that  it  has  become  possible  to 
look  calmly  at  certain  conclusions,  the  bare  enunciation  of 
which  not  long  ago  stirred  up  angry  feelings.  The  claim 
of  criticism  to  deal  with  such  questions  has  been  acknow- 
ledged, and  ordinary  people  are  able  without  passion  to 
consider  the  arguments  vrhich  are  urged  in  support  of 
theories  which  may  be  very  much  at  variance  with 
received  views.  And  then  there  is  this  other  great 
advantage,  that  the  modern  theory  of  Israel's  history 
can  now  be  exhibited  as  a  completed  whole,  and,  taken 
merely  as  a  hypothesis,  can  be  brought  to  the  test  of 
admitted  phenomena  and  facts.  "It  is  always  some- 
thing to  be  thankful  for  when,  in  any  department  of 
human  knowledge,  a  hypothesis  is  adequately  stated,  de- 
fended, and  worked  out.  If  it  turn  out  an  error,  it  is 
an  error  to  which  full  justice  has  been  done,  and  which 
may  be  finally  put  aside."  ^  The  only  way,  however,  in 
which  the  truth  or  error  of  a  hypothesis  can  be  shown, 
is  to  apply  it  to  the  explanation  of  actual  phenomena — 
that  is,  in  a  case  like  the  present,  to  bring  it  to  the  test 
of  certain  undisputed  facts  of  literature  and  history,  in 
face  of  which  it  has  to  justify  itself.  Accordingly,  the 
method  of  our  inquiry  is  to  take  our  stand  at  certain 
clearly  marked  points  in  history  or  undisputed  phenomena 
of  literature,  and  to  ask  what  account  is  given  of  them 
respectively  by  the  Biblical  writers  and  by  modern  his- 
torians of  Israel.  Such  an  inquiry  is  not  beyond  the 
ability  of  the  intelligent  reader  of  the  English  Bible ;  in 
its  prosecution  he  will  be  able,  at  all  events,  to  distinguish 
between  what  demands  technical  skill  for  its  settlement, 
and  what  appeals  to  ordinary  sound  reason. 

The  essential  and  fundamental  matters  in  dispute  in 
1  A.  B.  Bruce  in  'Present  Day  Tracts,'  No.  38,  p.  55. 


Temptations  of  Specialists.  7 

this  controversy  are  not  questions  of  "  scholarsliip "  at 
all,  in  the  proper  sense  of  that  term.  It  so  happens,  as 
a  matter  of  course,  that  the  men  who  have  gone  most 
thoroughly  into  these  questions  have  been  trained  He- 
braists ;  but  the  bare  facts  of  a  linguistic  character  with 
which  they  have  to  deal,  count  for  very  little  in  the 
essential  questions  at  issue,  as  critical  writers  themselves 
have  confessed.^  These  writers  are  specialists,  it  is  true,  but 
specialists  dealing  with  matters  in  which  common-sense 
may  follow  them,  observe  their  processes,  and  pronounce 
upon  their  validity.  Specialists  are  very  prone  to  become 
theorists,  and  a  specialist  with  a  theory  is  a  very  unsafe 
guide  when  questions  of  evidence  have  to  be  settled. 
Modern  critical  writers  are  in  the  habit  of  pointing  to  the 
shifts  which  in  past  times  have  been  resorted  to  in  order 
to  maintain  some  traditional  theory  that  was  untenable ; 
and  too  much  occasion  has  been  given  them  to  do  so. 
But  a  little  sense  of  humour  might  enable  them  to  per- 
ceive the  ridiculousness  of  many  of  the  processes  carried 
on  in  all  seriousness  in  the  name  of  criticism.  The  Hebrew 
scholar  or  trained  critic  may,  by  the  very  possession  of 
his  special  qualifications,  see  possible  combinations,  and 
suggest  possible  constructions  or  emendations  of  a  passage 
that  the  ordinary  reader  would  never  dream  of;  and  ho 
may  combine  and  transpose  and  eliminate  and  amend, 
and  by  a  triumph  of  ingenuity  bring  out  a  most  unex- 
pected result,  while  all  the  time  perhaps  a  simple  and 
plain  meaning  of  a  phrase  or  passage  stares  him  in 
the  face,  from  which,  however,  he  gets  away  to  one 
quite  recondite  or  fanciful.  An  old  Eastern  friend  of 
mine  used  to  say  there  were  people  who,  when  asked 
"  Where  is  your  ear  ? "  would  put  their  right  hand  over 

1  See  Note  I. 


§  Introduction. 

the  top  of  their  head  and  triumphantly  seize  hold  of  their 
left  ear.  There  is  an  acrobatic  criticism,  which  is  more 
sensational  than  sensible.  The  qualifications  of  the 
specialist  render  him  peculiarly  prone  to  push  a  theory 
at  all  hazards,  when  to  common-sense  it  appears  mani- 
festly overweighted.  Too  much  praise  cannot  be  given 
to  Continental  critics  for  their  perseverance,  but  per- 
severance may  be  carried  too  far.  Some  years  ago  I 
was  amused  and  instructed  by  the  industry  and  ingenu- 
ity of  a  waggoner  at  Leipzig,  whose  cart,  heavily  laden, 
had  stuck  fast  in  deep  sand.  After  every  ordinary 
expedient  had  been  tried  in  vain,  he  went  away,  evi- 
dently to  some  distance,  and  returned  with  a  powerful 
screw -lever,  by  the  help  of  which  the  wheels  were 
sufficiently  raised  to  admit  of  the  insertion  of  planks  for 
rails;  and  so,  after  a  long  delay,  he  drove  off  without 
lightening  his  waggon.  Eecently  I  had  an  opportunity 
of  observing  the  method  of  a  Glasgow  carter  in  a  similar 
difficulty.  He  had  inconsiderately  placed  his  lorry  on  soft 
yielding  ground,  and  loaded  it  with  timber  from  the 
Exhibition  buildings.  As  soon  as  he  realised  his  position, 
he  unloaded  his  cart,  drew  it  on  to  firm  ground  a  few 
yards  off,  replaced  the  same  amount  upon  it,  and  drove 
off  in  a  few  minutes.  Both  men  succeeded  at  last,  but 
I  confess  I  admired  the  method  of  lightening  the  cart 
when  the  ground  was  insecure.  When  difficulties  increase 
at  every  step  of  a  hypothesis,  it  is  time  to  inquire  whether 
the  hypothesis  itself  is  not  at  fault. 

One  indispensable  qualification  for  pursuing  an  inquiry 
like  the  present,  is  that  knowledge  of  human  nature  and 
sympathy  with  it  which  we  call  common-sense.  There 
is,    Matthew   Arnold   tells    us,^    a    mechanical   criticism, 

^  God  and  the  Bible,  chap.  iii.  ad  init. 


Mechanical  Criticism.  9 

which  "  takes  for  granted  that  things  are  naturally  all  of 
a  piece,  and  follow  one  uniform  rule ;  and  that  to  know 
that  this  is  so,  and  to  judge  things  by  the  light  of  this 
knowledge,  is  the  secret  for  sure  criticism.  People  do  not 
vary ;  people  do  not  contradict  themselves ;  people  do  not 
have  undercurrents  of  meaning ;  people  do  not  divine. 
If  they  are  represented  as  having  said  one  thing  to-day 
and  its  seeming  opposite  to-morrow,  one  of  the  two  they 
are  credited  with  falsely.  If  they  are  represented  as 
liaving  said  what  in  its  plain  literal  acceptation  would  not 
hold  good,  they  cannot  have  said  it.  If  they  are  rep- 
resented as  speaking  of  an  event  before  it  happened, 
they  did  not  so  speak  of  it, — the  words  are  not  theirs." 
Such  a  criticism,  as  he  says,  is,  for  negative  purposes, 
particularly  useful;  and  it  may  be  prosecuted  so  as  to 
bring  out  very  surprising  results.  But  a  very  ordinary 
knowledge  of  human  nature  and  experience  of  human 
life  will  be  sufficient  to  show  that  conclusions  drawn  in 
this  way  are  quite  precarious  or  even  repugnant  to 
common-sense.  Whatever  view  is  ultimately  to  prevail 
in  regard  to  the  subject  of  which  we  have  now  to  treat, 
must  commend  itself  to  the  general  intelligence  of  ordinary 
thinking  people.  There  are  questions  raised  which  are  of 
much  deeper  than  merely  antiquarian  interest — questions 
that  have  usually  been  associated  very  closely  with  the 
sanctions  of  religion  and  with  matters  of  practical  life. 
It  is  of  vital  importance  that  the  views  held  on  such 
subjects  should  be  gained  by  intelligent  conviction.  For 
practical  use  they  are  of  no  more  value  if  received  on  the 
authority  of  scholars  and  experts  than  if  accepted  by 
tradition  or  custom.  Nor  need  there  be  any  fear  of  the 
result  of  an  appeal  on  such  subjects  to  the  common-sense 
of  reflecting  people,  who  are  neither  tied  fast  to  a  tradi- 


10  Tntrod  action. 

tional  theory  nor  liable  to  be  sophisticated  ]:)y  plausible 
special  pleading.  The  verdict  may  be  that  views  long  held 
require  to  be  considerably  modified ;  it  may  also  be  that 
much  that  is  now  put  forward  as  certain  is  at  least  very 
doubtful.  But  the  inquiry,  if  conducted  honestly,  can  only 
tend  to  the  advancement  of  truth. 


CHAPTEE    I. 

THE  RELIGIOUS   CHARACTER   OF  THE  HISTORY  OF  ISRAEL. 

Place  of  Israel  among  the  nations  of  antiquity — Land,  lilerature,  institu- 
tions— The  distinctive  feature  of  the  history  is  the  religion — Its  world- 
wide  influence :  modern  Judaism,  Christianity,  Islam — '■^  National  reli- 
gions and  universal  religions" — As  a  matter  of  history  the  religion 
of  Israel  is  '^  something  more"  than  other  principal  religions — The  ques- 
tion is,  ]Miat  is  the  difference  ?  and  for  an  answer  we  must  go  back  to  the 
earlier  times. 

The  history  of  Israel  has  attractions  such  as  no  other 
history  presents.  Ko  nation  ever  had  so  wonderful  a 
beginning;  none  exhibits  a  more  tragic  close.  The  figures 
that  mark  the  stadia  of  its  checkered  history  are  not  the 
dim  shadowy  forms  tliat  elsewhere  meet  us  in  antiquity, 
but  men  of  warm  human  sympathy,  with  strongly  marked 
individuality.  The  details  of  the  lives  of  Old  Testament 
worthies  have  wrought  themselves  into  all  literatures,  and 
made  themselves  the  world's  possession.  People  in  modern 
Christian  lands  are  more  familiar  with  the  history  of  Israel 
tlian  with  the  ancient  history  of  their  own  countries,  and 
feel  more  interest  in  the  characters  of  Old  Testament  story 
than  in  the  great  men  of  their  own  nations.  The  graphic 
delineations  of  patriarchs  and  heroes  take  powerful  hold  of 
the  imagination  of  the  old  and  young  in  all  lands.    The 


1 2  Eeligious  Character  of  the  Ilibtory  of  Israel. 

missionary  to  the  heathen  finds  a  ready  access  to  the  minds 
of  his  hearers  by  means  of  the  simple  and  impressive 
recital  of  the  deeds  of  Israel's  great  men.  And  in  the 
battles  for  religious  freedom  and  national  righteousness, 
reformers  have  been  nerved  by  the  example  of  Old  Testa- 
ment patriots  and  prophets  to  fight  manfully  for  the  truth. 
The  very  land  v^hich  was  the  home  of  Israel  is  unique 
in  its  geographical  and  topographical  features.  A  piece 
of  territory  no  larger  than  Wales  embraces  within  itself 
the  climate,  natural  scenery,  and  products  of  lands  the  most 
far  apart.  By  its  physical  features  and  natural  boundaries 
it  is  as  sharply  marked  off  from  adjacent  lands,  as  it  is 
distinguished  from  any  country  of  its  size  on  the  face  of 
the  earth.  Within  this  territory,  debarred  for  the  most 
part  from  the  seaboard,  lived  a  people  that  was  contem- 
poraneous with  the  great  world-empires  of  antiquity,  but 
in  true  greatness  has  infinitely  surpassed  them.  Looked 
at  as  one  of  the  nationalities  of  Western  Asia,  its  external 
history  seemed  indeed  to  run  a  course  parallel  with  theirs. 
A  number  of  kindred  tribes  are  federated  together,  and  after 
a  time  the  monarchy  arises.  Then  a  schism  takes  place, 
and  there  is  a  double  line  of  kings,  waging  their  wars  and 
ruling  their  states  very  much  after  the  fashion  of  the  kings 
around  them.  TJie  institutions,  the  priesthood,  the  ritual, 
the  language  of  Israel,  bear  strong  resemblances  to  those 
of  kindred  Semitic  peoples  in  their  neighbourhood;  and 
finally,  when  the  great  world-powers  absorb  those  other 
nationalities  or  sweep  them  away,  the  Israelitish  state  is 
also  shattered,  and  its  people  disappears  from  the  scene. 
Yet,  looked  at  more  closely,  Israel  presents  a  broad  con- 
trast to  those  smaller  kindred  states,  and  is  in  essential 
points  clearly  distinguished  from  the  greater  world-em- 
pires.    For  Israel  has  not  ceased  to  exist,  and  its  influ- 


Israel  and  the  World-Empires.  13 

ence  has  gone  forth  into  all  the  earth.  The  petty  nation- 
alities of  kindred  blood  in  the  immediate  neighbourhood 
have  disappeared,  leaving  scarcely  a  trace  of  their  existence. 
The  great  empires  of  Assyria  and  Egypt,  whose  armies 
fought  across  the  body  of  Israel  for  world-dominion,  have 
crumbled  to  ruins.  The  Eoman  empire,  with  its  iron  heel, 
trampled  the  Jewish  nationality  to  the  ground,  but  there 
was  a  vitality  which  it  could  not  crush.  Greece,  like 
Palestine,  was  a  small  country,  and  its  people,  like  Israel, 
played  a  distinguished  part  in  the  world's  history.  Israel, 
however,  had  put  on  record  complete  annals  of  its  mar- 
vellous career  before  the  time  that  the  "  father  of  history  " 
appeared  in  Greece;^  and  though  possessing  neither  the 
art,  nor  the  philosophy,  nor  the  science  of  ancient  Egypt, 
has  effected  in  the  world  what  neither  Greece  with  all 
these  acquirements,  nor  Eome  with  its  law,  nor  the  East- 
ern empires  with  their  massive  force,  could  accomplish. 

Something  very  distinctive  must  have  been  early  achieved 
or  acquired  by  Israel  to  enable  it  to  remain  apart  from 
these  nationalities,  great  or  small,  and  to  outlast  them  so 
conspicuously.  It  was  something  of  a  more  fundamental 
kind  than  the  ordinary  attainments  of  civilisation — some- 
thing nearer  to  the  heart  of  mankind,  belonging  in  a 
manner  to  all  ages,  and  destined  to  last  when  the  strait 
bonds  of  Jewish  nationality  should  have  been  snapped, 
and  when  the  greatest  of  world-empires  should  have  done 
their  best  and  their  worst  for  the  human  race.  By  some 
inherent  force  this  race,  set  in  the  midst  of  the  great 
nations  of   the  earth,  and  surrounded  by  powerful  em- 

1  The  date  of  Herodotus  is  484-443  B.C. ;  Ezra  came  to  Jerusalem  in  the 
year  458.  The  pre-Socratic  period  of  Greek  philosophy  falls  between  550 
and  430  B.C.  ;  the  books  of  Hosea  and  Amos  date  from  before  the  fall  of 
Samaria  in  721  B.C. 


1 4  Rcliijious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel. 

pires,  not  only  held  its  independent  national  existence, 
and  maintained  itself  unaffected  in  the  highest  degree 
by  world  influences,  speaking  its  own  language,  practising 
its  own  customs,  observing  its  own  laws,  proudly  regarding 
itself  as  a  race  destined  to  highest  distinction  and  even  to 
world-dominion,  but  even  at  the  moment  of  its  political 
extinction  held  aloft  the  banner  of  national  supremacy 
and  undying  hope.  Nor  have  its  expectations  been  falsi- 
fied. Scattered  to  the  four  winds  of  heaven,  trodden  down 
as  the  mire  of  the  streets,  persecuted  in  strange  lands, 
wandering  from  end  to  end  of  a  continent  in  search  of  a 
resting-place,  it  has  remained  one  in  all  that  constituted 
its  unity  before  its  independence  was  lost.  Even  in  this 
cosmopolitan  age,  when  men  of  every  nationality  are  be- 
coming daily  more  and  more  citizens  of  the  world,  and 
when  the  modern  Jew  of  Britain,  or  America,  or  Germany, 
or  France,  makes  it  his  poor  boast  that  he  is  an  English- 
man, an  American,  a  German,  or  a  Frenchman,  his  very 
speech  bewrayeth  him,  and  he  is  classed  as  a  member  of 
the  one  race  which  is  the  scorn  of  many,  the  dread  of 
some,  the  wonder  of  all.  For,  as  a  nation  or  race,  the 
Jewish  people  lives  on,  and  has  a  definite  influence  on 
the  events  of  contemporary  history ;  and  this  though  it 
is  a  nation  without  a  home  and  without  independent 
political  existence.  It  is  a  great  thing  to  have  the  con- 
trol, to  the  extent  that  they  enjoy,  of  the  money  which 
is  intimately  bound  up  with  the  prosecution  of  any  under- 
taking, literary,  commercial,  or  philanthropic,  to  be  the  ar- 
biters of  war  or  peace,  the  masters  of  the  Exchange.  The 
modern  movement  against  the  Jews  in  some  parts  of  Europe, 
though  it  may  have  its  root  in  the  very  thing  we  have  in- 
dicated, shows  also  that  the  influence  of  this  wonderful  race 
is  not  merely  monetary  but  intellectual.     Even  if  it  is 


The  Uniting  Bond  of  Israel.  15 

their  possession  of  wealth  that  gives  them  the  advantage, 
the  genius  that  could  create  the  wealth,  and  so  manipulate 
it  as  to  maintain  pre-eminence,  is  evidently  a  power  of  a 
high  degree.  To  instruct  the  world  in  the  worship  of 
Mammon,  after  having  taught  it  the  knowledge  of  God,  is 
no  common  achievement.  A  power  like  this,  without 
political  independence  at  its  back,  implies  an  inner  uniting 
bond  of  no  common  kind;  and  when  we  ask  what  that 
bond  is,  we  are  driven  back  to  the  earlier  history  of  the 
people  for  an  answer.  The  possession  of  wealth  by  the 
race  is  of  comparatively  modern  origin,  brought  about  by 
their  exclusion  from  the  ordinary  trades  and  professions, 
which  were  practised  iu  the  times  when  they  suffered  per- 
secution at  the  hands  of  Christians.  But  the  bond  that 
unites  them  is  of  much  older  date:  they  had  become  a 
historic  people,  and  had  indeed  achieved  the  best  part  of 
their  history,  before  tlieir  corporate  life  had  assumed  this 
special  phase.  Persecution  had  its  chief  motive  in  their 
distinctiveness,  and  largely  tended  to  perpetuate  it. 

The  bond  which  united  this  people  and  enabled  them 
to  achieve  their  distinction  in  the  world  was  a  religious 
one ;  and  the  specific  contribution  of  ancient  Israel  to  the 
j^orld's'^ood  was  the  knowledge  of  their  religion.  "  The 
foundation  upon  which,  at  all  periods,  Israel's  sense  of  its 
national  unity  rested,  was  religious  in  its  character."^ 
"  The  history  of  Israel  is  essentially  a  history  of  religious 
ideas."  ^  The  great  Eastern  empires,  by  a  crushing  despot- 
ism, welded  peoples  into  kingdoms  of  colossal  size,  and 
prepared  a  field  upon  which  more  civilising  influences 
could  have  play  when  the  fit  time  arrived.  The  people  of 
Israel  attained  no  such  empire,  and  left  no  such  remains  of 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  433. 

2  Stade,  Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  12. 

1 


1 6  Religious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel. 

greatness  as  these  empires  exhibit.  Their  territory  even  at 
the  largest  was  but  small ;  they  remained  but  a  short  time 
in  these  limited  dominions  ;  and  their  country,  when  they 
left  it,  became  a  No-man's-land,  whose  inhabitants  at  the 
present  day  own  a  foreign  master,  and  have  no  attach- 
ment to  it  beyond  an  instinctive  clinging  to  the  soil  that 
supports  them.  Eome  gave  the  world  a  system  of  law  which 
remained  an  active  influence  throughout  Europe  after  the 
great  Eoraan  empire  was  shattered.  Greece  died  in  giving 
birth  to  immortal  art,  poetry,  and  science.  Ancient  Israel, 
on  the  contrary,  never  cultivated  art  nor  distinguished  it- 
self in  philosophy ;  and,  so  far  from  seeking  to  influence 
the  great  world,  kept  jealously  aloof  from  its  movements. 
What  Israel  has  given  to  the  world  is  a  literature  of  a 
very  peculiar  kind,  intensely  national  in  the  first  place, 
instinct  with  an  eloquence  and  a  poetry  of  its  own  kind ; 
but  above  all,  and  herein  specifically  different  from  all 
other  national  literatures,  permeated  from  beginning  to 
end  with  religion.  From  a  very  ancient  time  writers  in 
this  nation  have  set  themselves  to  give  the  story,  and  a 
connected  story,  of  their  own  rise  and  growth,  to  codify 
the  laws,  to  put  on  record  the  words  and  deeds  of  teachers 
and  leaders ;  and  whether  or  not  a  part,  great  or  small, 
of  such  ancient  literature  has  been  lost,  one  feature  char- 
acterises what  we  possess,  it  is  of  a  religious  cast,  and 
national  only  because  it  is  religious.  A  nation  is  historical 
only  when  it  makes  history,  and  a  nation  records  its 
history  only  when  it  becomes  conscious  that  it  has  a 
history  to  record;  and  therefore  the  earliest  of  these 
records  which  have  this  national  and  religious  tone,  prove 
that  at  the  time  of  their  composition  Israel  had  a  con- 
sciousness of  its  own  significant  position  in  the  world,  and 
a  belief  that  its  history  was  worthy  of  being  recorded. 


03&-' 


IsraeVs  Religion  not  extinct.  if 

"The  self-consciousness  of  the  religion  of  Israel,"  says 
Dr  A.  B.  Davidson,^  "  is  a  phenomenon  almost  more  sing- 
ular than  the  religion  itself."  Of  course  it  is  to  be  ad- 
mitted that  the  existence  of  such  writings,  when  once 
they  did  exist,  had  much  to  do  with  the  making  and 
moulding  of  the  succeeding  history ;  but  the  fact  of  their 
existing  is  first  of  all  a  proof  that  the  nation  was  con- 
scious that  it  had  some  great  part  to  play. 

Yet  the  religion  which  was  the  bond  uniting  Israel  and 
giving  that  people  their  peculiar  position  in  the  world,  is 
not  a  dry  system  enshrined  in  ancient  documents  to  furnish 
study  for  the  archaeologist.  Other  nations  of  the  ancient 
world  had  their  religious  systems,  expounded  by  philoso- 
phers, guarded  by  priests,  supported  by  the  state,  adorned 
with  the  ritual  which  the  highest  art  could  elaborate. 
These  religions,  however,  faded  from  the  view  of  the 
world  with  the  decadence  of  the  peoples  who  professed 
them,  and  are  now  painfully  restored  from  forgotten 
writings  and  crumbling  monuments ;  and  even  when 
recovered  seem  at  best  but  like  distant  echoes  of  the 
religion  of  Israel.  This,  like  the  people  themselves,  has 
never  ceased  to  be  in  evidence  before  the  world,  endued 
with  endless  vitality,  and  is  operating  at  the  present  day 
in  a  wider  field  than  its  first  professors  ever  dreamed  of. 
We  know  how  the  religious  systems  of  Greece  and  Eome  j 
crumbled  to  powder  before  the  preaching  of  Jewish  mis- 
sionaries, men  of  little  learning  and  of  no  social  position ; 
and  how  all  that  was  best  in  the  art  and  political  life 
of  the  most  civilised  nations  of  antiquity  has  been  made 
subservient  to  the  spread  of  a  religion  which  came  from 
despised  Judaea. 

For  not  only  does  the  world  owe  to  Israel  the  religion 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  vi.  p.  165. 
B 


is  Beligious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel. 

of  the  Old  Testament,  which  for  the  time  was  clearly 
distinguishable  from  the  religions  of  contemporaneous 
nations,  but  to  the  religion  of  Israel  we  must  trace  back 
by  direct  descent  the  two  greatest  religions  of  succeeding 
times,  Christianity  and  Mohammedanism.  These  two, 
with  Buddhism,  exhibit  the  highest  attainments  of  the 
human  race  in  the  matter  of  religion;  to  them,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  merely  local  and  national  religions, 
has  been  given  the  name  of  Universal  or  World  religions, 
because  there  is  something  in  their  character,  as  proved 
by  their  reception  and  spread,  that  fits  them  for  peoples 
of  various  climes  and  of  various  race.  Buddhism,  no 
doubt,  so  far  as  numbers  go,  bulks  more  largely  on  the 
map  of  the  world  than  Islam,  yet  as  a  factor  in  the  great 
world's  history  it  has  not  had  so  distinguished  a  career ; 
it  has  been  more  a  religion  of  thought  than  of  action.  And] 
then,  in  its  adaptation  to  the  wants  of  man  of  every  grade- 
of  civilisation,  of  every  tribe  and  tongue,  in  the  spiritu-i 
ality  of  its  teaching  and  in  its  living  power,  Christianity,  | 
as  the  history  of  the  world  shows,  occupies  a  place 
peculiarly  its  own. 

It  is  a  matter  of  history,  which  very  few  question,  that 
both  these  religions  are  traceable  directly  to  the  religion  of 
Israel.^  There  may  be  differences  in  the  modes  in  which 
the  influence  is  traced,  and  as  to  the  precise  amount  of  the 
dependence ;  but  there  can  be  no  question  that  both  Jesus 
and  His  apostles  represented  the  faith  of  Abraham  as  the 
foundation  of  Christianity,  ^  and  that  Mohammed  appealed 
to  the  same  spiritual  ancestor,  declaring  that  Abraham  was 
neither  a  Jew  nor  a  Christian,  but  a  Muslim. ^     Thus  two 

1  Kuenen,  National  Religions  and  Universal  Religions,  p.  56. 

2  Renan,  Hist,  du  Peuple  d'Israel,  i.,  Pref.  p.  iii. 

3  The  Koran,  Sura  ii    60. 


Missionary  Religions,  19 

religions,  which  have  been  intimately  bound  up  with  the 
political  and  social  movements  of  the  world,  which  have 
subjugated  to  themselves  nations  in  the  foremost  rank  of 
intelligence,  which  have  proved  themselves  adapted  to  peo- 
ples of  the  most  diverse  birth  and  training,  and  which  are 
at  the  present  moment  rivalling  one  another  in  the  mission* 
ary  zeal  with  which  they  are  propagated,  are  directly  found- 
ed upon  the  religion  of  old  Israel,  which  never  was  anything 
more  than  the  religion  of  a  small  and  isolated  people.  Mo- 
hammed gave  forth  the  Koran  as  "  a  warning  to  all  crea- 
tures,"^ and  even  in  his  lifetime  sent  a  peremptory  summons, 
prophet  of  Arabia  as  he  was,  to  both  the  King  of  Persia 
and  the  Emperor  of  Constantinople,  as  well  as  to  other 
minor  potentates,  to  accept  the  religion  of  Islam.  And 
the  command  of  Jesus,  in  fulfilment  of  which  His  follow- 
ers travelled  in  all  directions  and  suffered  every  hardship, 
was :  "  Go  ye  into  all  the  world,  and  make  disciples  of 
all  nations."  But  though  claiming  direct  descent  from 
Israel's  religion,  they  have  this  very  point  in  sharp  con- 
trast to  it,  that  they  both  very  soon  became  universal 
religions,  whereas  it  remained,  and  still  remains,  a  religion 
of  one  people.  We  have  instances  of  the  religion  of  Israel 
coming  under  the  view,  of  other  nations,  as  in  the  story  of 
Jonah ;  and  there  were,  no  doubt,  all  along,  foreign  con- 
verts to  the  Hebrew  faith.  But  never  did  the  religion 
of  Israel  set  about  a  propaganda;  it  was  only  in  late 
times,  when  the  faiths  of  the  pagan  world  were  dying 
away,  that  in  sickness  of  heart  the  religiously  minded  of 
the  Gentiles  became  proselytes  to  Judaism,  and  found 
it  a  stepping-stone  to  Christianity.  Yet  though  the  faith 
of  Israel  remained  restricted  to  one  race,  not  only  did  it 
by  direct  genealogy  bring  forth  the  two  great  missionary 

*  The  Koran,  Sura  xsxviii.  87, 


20  Eclirjious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel. 

religions,  but  it  gave  unmistakable  intimations  that  the 
truth  which  it  contained  would  have  world-wide  exten- 
sion. As  if  conscious,  on  the  one  hand,  that  they  were 
proclaiming  imperishable  and  universal  truth,  its  writers 
gave  the  most  glowing  anticipations  of  a  latter  day  of 
glory,  when  out  of  Zion  should  go  forth  the  law,  and  the 
word  of  the  Lord  from  Jerusalem — the  word  which  would 
lead  all  nations  to  walk  in  the  light  of  the  Lord.  On 
the  other  hand,  as  if  conscious  that  this  truth  was  for 
the  time  held  in  too  narrow  bonds  for  acceptance  by  all 
nations,  they  abstained  from  pressing  it  upon  the  Gentiles, 
and  were  content  to  hold  up  the  witness  through  the  long 
years  of  waiting  till  the  fulness  of  the  time  should  come. 

A  consideration  of  such  facts  as  these  will  have  a  cer- 
tain influence  on  the  mode  in  which  we  have  to  approach 
the  religion  of  Israel,  as  v/ill  be  indicated  presently. 
They  have  been  pointed  out  in  the  meantime  as  outstand- 
ing features  of  the  subject,  which  invest  the  religious 
history  of  Israel  with  peculiar  interest,  and  have  always 
attracted  the  attention  of  thinkers  and  scholars  in  an  un- 
common degree.  Just  as  in  the  New  Testament  history, 
where  the  life  of  Jesus  has  been  felt  to  be  the  key-stone  of 
the  whole  structure,  writers  of  every  shade  of  opinion  have 
taken  in  hand  to  explain  His  influence  on  the  succeedr 
ing  development  of  Christianity;  so  in  the  field  of  Old 
Testament  inquiry  the  greatest  industry  and  the  keenest 
ingenuity  have  been  exercised  in  the  attempt  to  account 
for  the  origin  of  that  peculiarly  religious  cast  of  thought, 
which  is  so  observable  in  the  Hebrew  literature.  The 
very  earliest  attempts  at  Old  Testament  criticism  had  their 
point  of  departure  in  dogmatic  considerations  ;  and  though 
for  a  time  the  labours  of  scholars  assumed  a  more  tech- 
nically critical  and  literary  aspect,  the   historical   view 


Histories  of  Israel.  21 

was  never  entirely  lost  sight  of,  and  lias  of  late  again  dom- 
inated the  whole  process  of  criticism.  Even  the  works 
which  profess  to  deal  in  the  most  technical  manner  with 
the  Old  Testament  books  have  at  their  basis  a  theory 
of  the  Old  Testament  history;  and  of  recent  years  we 
have  had  an  increasing  number  of  attempts  to  set  forth 
the  history  in  a  more  formal  manner  according  to  the 
principles  of  historical  criticism,  till  we  have  almost  as 
many  Histories  of  Israel,  and  from  as  varied  standpoints, 
as  we  have  Lives  of  Jesus.  It  is  not  without  reason  that 
M.  Eenan — who,  according  to  his  own  estimate,  would 
have  anticipated  the  discoveries  of  Darwin  had  he  given 
himself  in  early  life  to  the  study  of  physical  science,^  and 
who  now  almost  reGjrets  that  he  had  not  devoted  his 
lifetime  to  tlie  history  of  Greek  thought^ — after  work- 
ing out  for  forty  years  a  design  of  his  earlier  years  to 
write  '  The  History  of  the  Origins  of  Christianity,'  closes 
his  lifelong  labour  with  the  'History  of  the  People  of 
Israel.'  ^ 

A  religion  which  has  had  a  history  like  this,  and  has 
attracted  such  attention  from  investigators,  proves  itself 
thereby  to  have  more  than  common  features,  and  cannot 
be  approached  with  indifference.  It  is  true  that  the  most 
of  the  modern  writers  who  have  undertaken  histories  of 
Israel  make  great  professions  of  impartiality  and  freedom 
from  prejudice.  Thus  Kuenen  in  the  opening  of  his 
*  Eeligion  of  Israel '  says  * :  "  Our  standpoint  is  sketched  in 
a  single  stroke,  as  it  were,  by  the  manner  in  which  this 
work  sees  the  light.  It  does  not  stand  entirely  alone, 
but  is  one  of  a  number  of  monographs  on  '  the  principal 

^  Souvenirs  d'Enfance  et  de  Jeunesse,  p.  2C3. 

2  Hist.  d'Israel,  l,  Pref.  p.  vi  ff. 

*  See  Note  II.  4  p^j^g  transl,,  vol.  i.  p.  5. 


22         Beligious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel, 

religions.'  For  us  the  Israelitish  is  one  of  these  religions, 
nothing  less,  but  also  nothing  more."  This  sounds  exceed- 
ingly impartial,  but  he  "  doth  protest  too  much,  methinks." 
It  may  be  questioned  whether  this  is  not  an  assuming 
of  a  standpoint  from  which  it  is  impossible  to  give  a 
sufficient  account  of  the  matter  in  hand.  If  it  be  indeed 
possible  for  one  to  regard  all  religions  with  perfect 
impartiality  as  so  many  phases  of  man's  activity,  we 
may  expect  from  such  a  one  an  even-handed  treatment 
of  all ;  but  such  an  impartiality  is  very  apt  to  run  into 
an  equalising  and  levelling  of  all.  At  all  events,  for 
those  who  regard  Christianity  as  occupying  a  peerless 
position  among  the  "principal  religions,"  and  who  have 
perceived  the  way  in  which  it  appeals  to  the  religion  of 
the  Old  Testament,  it  would  be  vain  to  pretend  to  have 
no  prepossession  in  the  matter.  It  is  not  necessary  that 
the  historian  of  a  country  should  be  a  foreigner;  and 
we  prefer  that  a  biographer  should  be  one  who  was 
intimately  acquainted  and  in  sympathy  with  the  person 
whose  character  is  to  be  described.  A  handful  of  jewels 
are,  from  one  point  of  view,  just  so  many  minerals ;  but 
we  should  think  none  the  less  of  a  lapidary  whose  eyes 
sparkled  when  he  discovered  among  them  "one  pearl  of 
great  price."  A  joiner  or  cabinetmaker  may  say  that 
from  his  standpoint  three  planks  of  wood  are  nothing 
less  and  nothing  more,  though  one  may  be  cut  from  the 
trunk  and  the  others  from  large  limbs  of  the  same  tree ; 
and  the  anatomist  may  describe  simply  as  so  many 
"  subjects "  the  dead  bodies  of  a  mother  and  her  two 
daughters.  From  their  standpoint  they  are  right  enough  ; 
the  question  is  as  to  the  standpoint.  Religions  are  not 
so  many  things  that  may  be  laid  on  the  bench  or  dissect- 
iiig-table,  so  that  learned  men  may  write   a  series  of 


"Something  more "  than  other  Religions.  23 

monographs  upon  tliem.  They  are  not  so  many  dry 
systems  that  can  be  circumscribed  by  "  documents "  and 
examined  in  books.  No  religion  that  has  made  its  mark 
in  the  world  can  be  thus  appreciated.  Account  must  be 
taken  of  the  character  of  the  founders  and  first  teachers, 
as  well  as  of  the  doctrines  or  systems  they  have  left; 
and  above  all,  the  effects  of  the  religion  in  the  world 
must  in  each  case  be  estimated,  if  we  would  know  what 
the  power  of  the  religion  is.  Now  the  religion  of  Israel, 
by  its  very  position  in  the  world,  has  been  "  something 
more"  in  some  sense  than  other  religions.  No  other 
religion  has  had  so  striking  an  origin,  so  persistent  an 
existence,  and  so  wide  an  influence,  if  we  take  into 
account  the  two  religions  which  have  sprung  from  it. 
And  the  main  question  before  a  historian  of  Israel's 
religion  is  to  make  plain  what  the  "  something  more  "  is. 
But  to  set  out  with  a  formula  or  equation  that  will  rep- 
resent the  history  of  all  religions,^  and  then  apply  it  to 
the  religion  of  Israel,  is  to  prejudge  the  whole  question 
in  a  most  unscientific  way,  and  to  run  in  the  teeth  of 
historical  fact.  The  science  of  comparative  religion  is 
legitimate,  and  most  useful ;  but  it  becomes  unscientific 
when  it  is  a  levelling  science.  Stade  very  properly  ^ 
assigns  to  the  religion  of  Israel  not  only  a  place  among 
the  principal  religions,  but  the  very  first  place,  —  the 
universal  religion,  in  a  much  fuller  sense  than,  e.g.,  the 
philosophy  of  Greece  or  the  law  of  Home  can  claim  to 
be  universal.  There  is  enough  in  the  external  history  of 
Israel  to  prepare  us  for  finding  in  it  something  very  dif- 
ferent from  what  other  ancient  religions  exhibit.  Is  it, 
impossible  that  there  should  be  unique  things  in  the 
world  ?  Is  it  scientific  to  assert  that  there  are  not  ?  We 
^  See  Note  III.  ^  Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel,  vol.  i.  pp.  3,  4. 


24  Eeligious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel. 

do  not  require  at  the  outset  to  claim  more  for  this  re- 
ligion than  for  other  religions ;  but  neither  are  we  allowed 
to  assume  at  the  outset  that  it  is  no  more  nor  better 
than  others.  What  we  have  seen  is  suflicient  at  least 
to  make  us  disposed  to  admit  any  features  that  can  clearly 
be  proved  to  exist,  even  though  they  have  no  counter- 
part in  other  ancient  religions.  Since  it  has,  in  later' 
historic  time,  had  a  unique  development,  it  need  be  no 
wonder  if  in  its  earlier  course  it  was  equally  distinguished, 

The  history  of  Israel,  then,  resolves  itself  into  a  history 
of  the  religion;  and  the  problem  of  the  history  is  to 
explain  the  possession  by  this  people  of  a  faith  and 
practice  which  distinguished  them  from  their  neighbours, 
and  made  them  the  religious  teachers  of  the  world. 
More  particularly,  it  is  to  the  earlier  portion  of  the  history 
that  attention  has  to  be  turned,  with  the  view  of  discover- 
ing, if  possible,  a  starting-point  which  will  form  a  suf- 
ficient explanation  of  all  that  followed. 

If  we  take  the  modern  orthodox  Jew  with  his  Talmud 
and  traditions,  we  can  give  no  account  of  him,  nor  under- 
stand his  persistent  adherence  to  peculiar  customs  and 
old-world  beliefs,  till  we  go  back  to  the  time  of  the 
formation  of  the  Talmud  itself.  And  as  soon  as  we 
begin  to  investigate  that  process,  we  are  compelled  to 
go  back  to  Ezra  and  his  contemporaries,  who  gave  the 
start  to  the  complicated  work  of  the  scribes.  And  when 
we  take  up  the  books  that  tell  us  of  the  activity  of  Ezra 
and  Nehemiah,  and  try  to  account  for  their  influence,  we 
find  we  are  not  only  at  the  beginning  of  one  course  of 
development,  but  also  at  the  end  of  a  long  anterior  one. 
A  great  part  of  the  writings  of  the  Old  Testament  was  by 
that  time  certainly  in  existence ;  the  political  history  of 
the  nation  in  its  independence  had  run  its  course,  and 


Atte7iipt  to  reach  the  Origin.  25 

its  religious  character  Lad  become  well  marked.  In  order 
to  discover  how  all  this  was  brought  about,  we  are  re- 
ferred to  an  earlier  period  of  their  history.  We  turn  to 
the  great  propliets  who  lived  and  wrote  before  the  exile, 
and  we  find  that,  while  their  conceptions  of  the  national 
religion  are  clear  and  positive,  they  do  not  regard  the 
religion  as  a  thing  of  their  own  day,  nor  claim  to  have 
reached  it  by  their  own  study.  The  very  earliest  of  the 
writing  prophets  to  whose  words  we  have  access,  appeal 
to  a  series  of  prophetic  men  before  them  who  had 
taught  the  same  truths,  and  presuppose  for  the  nation  of 
Israel  a  certain  religious  standing  wliich  rests  on  an 
antecedent  history  to  which  they  pointedly  and  repeatedly 
refer.  Attempting  to  make  our  way  still  farther  back, 
we  find  tlie  books  which  tell  of  the  activity  of  Moses,  the 
exodus  from  Egypt,  and  the  consolidation  of  the  people 
under  an  elaborate  system  of  law ;  and  we  seem  to  have 
reached  an  absolute  commencement.  But  even  the  Mosaic 
period  rests  on  an  earlier.  Moses  speaks  in  the  name  of 
tbe  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob,  and  the  same 
books  that  tell  of  the  work  of  the  great  lawgiver  are  full 
of  references  to  the  covenant  and  the  promise  made  to 
Abraham.  "With,  Abraham  the  history  of  Israel  as  a 
people  is  made  by  the  Old  Testament  writers  to  begin. 
From  him  the  nation  is  made  to  descend  by  ordinary 
generation ;  the  promise  made  to  him  is  seen  expanding 
in  the  succeeding  history ;  and  although  the  writers  give 
an  account  of  ages  preceding,  and  carry  their  history  back 
to  the  very  origin  of  tilings,  Abraham  is  made  to  stand  at 
the  watershed  where  the  national  life  of  Israel  has  its 
rise,  the  "nations"  of  the  world  being  thereafter  left  out 
of  account,  or  only  referred  to  in  connection  with  the 
fortunes  of  the  chosen  people. 


2G  Iteligious  Character  of  the  History  of  Israel, 

What  we  want  to  determine  is .  the  origin  of  this 
peculiarly  religious  cast  of  the  history  of  Israel,  and  the 
nature  of  the  religious  life  which  is  represented  as  running 
this  long  uninterrupted  course.  And  in  order  to  do  this, 
it  is  of  the  utmost  consequence  to  secure  a  firm  standing- 
ground  from  which  to  estimate  the  precise  course  of 
events. 


27 


I 

CHAPTEE    II. 

TWO   CONTENDING   THEORIES   OF  THE   HISTOKY. 

There  are  practically  Uoo  accounts  given  of  the  earlier  religion  of  Israel, 
that  of  the  Biblical  writers  and  that  of  modern  critics,  and  in  vital 
joints  they  are  opposed — The  Old  Testament  hooks  agree,  or  have  been 
mnde  to  agree,  in  their  statement  of  a  scheme — Its  outlines — 3Iodern 
objection  to  this  vieio  that  it  is  an  afterthought — Contending  theory 
advanced  by  critics — Its  outline — The  contrast — IIow  is  the  balance  to 
be  held  betiveen  them,  since  both  appeal  to  the  same  boohs? — Proposal 
to  leave  aside  at  the  outset  the  disputed  books  or  portions — Reasons 
given  for  this  method — Proceeding  from  the  known  and  admitted  to  the 
unknown  or  disputed — The  result  will,  among  other  things,  determine 
the  value  of  the  hooks  which  at  the  outset  are  left  out  of  account. 

We  have  seen  that  the  history  of  Israel  resolves  itself 
into  a  history  of  religious  ideas.  The  outstanding  events 
of  the  nation's  history  are  all  invested  by  the  Biblical 
writers  with  religious  significance ;  and  it  is  through  its 
religion  that  Israel  is  still  a  power  in  the  world.  A 
history  of  this  people  which  should  be  confined  to  polit-: 
ical  events  would  be  as  unsatisfactory  and  as  uninterest- 
ing as  a  history  of  Greece  which  should  take  no  account 
of  art,  philosophy,  or  science.  The  vital  point  is  to 
determine,  if  possible,  what  was  tlie  nature  of  the  earlier 
religion  of  this  people. 

There  are,  practically,  two  accounts  given  of  the  history 


28  Two  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

of  Israel's  earlier  religion,  between  which  we  have  to 
choose,^  and  they  are,  in  important  respects,  opposed  to 
each  other.  There  is  the  account  of  the  Biblical  writers, 
which  may  be  gathered  from  the  Old  Testament  books. 
"Whatever,  and  however  many,  may  be  the  original 
sources  of  which  the  Pentateuch  and  historical  books 
are  composed,  and  in  whatever  particulars  the  various 
sources  may  be  found  to  be  divergent  or  discordant 
among  themselves,  they  all  agree,  or  have  been  manipu- 
lated so  as  to  liave  the  appearance  of  agreeing,  in  the 
main  view  which  they  exhibit  of  the  course  througli 
which  the  history  ran.  These  books,  in  addition  to  an 
account  of  primeval  history  contained  in  the  first  eleven 
chapters  of  Genesis,  have,  in  the  remainder  of  that  book 
and  in  the  succeeding  books  to  the  end  of  2  Kings,  a 
connected  narrative  of  the  fortunes  of  Israel  from  the 
call  of  Abraham  to  the  time  of  the  Captivity;  and  the 
books  of  Ezra  and  Nehemiah  record  the  events  connected 
with  the  return.  Besides  these,  there  are  other  writings, 
particularly  those  of  the  prophets,  wliich  have  for  the 
most  part  their  known  historical  dates,  and  are  there- 
fore valuable  contributions  to  the  Biblical  account  of  the 
history.  Now  the  account  which  all  these  books  together 
give  of  the  history  is  ostensibly  consistent  and  of  one 
jtenor.^  It  amounts  to  tliis :  that  the  people  of  Israel, 
from  the  time  of  Abraham,  stood  in  a  peculiar  relation, 
to  God,  and  received  from  Him  special  intimations  of 
His  will  and  character,  and  were  by  Him  peculiarly 
guided  and  directed  in  their  growth  into  a  nation,  and 

1  See  Note  IV. 

2  The  books  of  Chronicles  are  confessedly  of  late  date,  and  stand  in 
some  respects  by  themselves.  Whatever  may  be  said  of  their  historic 
value  in  detail,  they  rest  on  the  earlier  books  and  imply  the  same  general 
scheme  of  history. 


Bihlical  Theory  siatecl^.  29 

in  their  existence  as  a  state.  By  a  signal  display  of 
divine  power  they  were  delivered  from  the  bondage  of 
Egypt  and  led  into  the  desert  of  Sinai,  where  the  cove- 
nant made  with  Abraham  was  renewed  with  awful 
sanctions.  Upon  the  covenant  was  reared  the  law, 
ordaining  holiness  on  God's  people,  fencing  round  their 
daily  life  with  ceremonial  prescriptions,  and  educating 
their  spiritual  life,  so  that  they  might  be  in  deed  as 
in  ideal  a  kingdom  of  priests,  an  holy  nation.  Up  to 
this  ideal,  however,  they  never  came.  On  the  con- 
trary, they  sinned  under  the  very  shadow  of  Sinai ;  and 
throughout  the  course  of  their  journey  in  the  wilder- 
ness, marked  as  it  was  by  constant  tokens  of  divine 
guidance,  they  exhibited  continual  backsliding,  and  fell 
into  one  corruption  after  another.  Even  when,  by  signal 
displays  of  divine  favour,  they  were  brought  into  the 
promised  land  and  made  victorious  over  its  inhabitants, 
they  sinned  against  the  God  who  had  favoured  them, 
and  conformed  to  the  practices  of  their  neighbours. 
Nevertheless  they  were  not  rejected,  nor  was  their  edu- 
cation interrupted.  A  series  of  prophets,  from  Samuel's 
time  onwards,  arose  to  testify  against  them  and  to  plead 
for  a  higher  life.  These  men,  with  one  voice,  whether  in 
the  northern  or  the  southern  kingdom,  tell  the  same  tale 
of  God's  great  doings  for  His  people  in  the  past ;  they  re- 
prove, rebuke,  exhort ;  they  confront  kings  and  people,  and 
denounce  priests  and  false  prophets  alike, — the  burden  of 
their  message  being  the  same  from  age  to  age.  Nor  do 
they  lose  faith  in  God's  promise.  As  troubles  gather  about 
the  nation,  their  reproof  of  sin  becomes  more  stern,  their 
enforcement  of  God's  righteousness  more  emphatic,  but 
their  trust  in  His  faithfulness  remains  unshaken.  As 
the  fabric  of  the  nation  falls  to  pieces,  their  views  be- 


80  Two  Contending  Tlieories  of  the  History. 

come  only  the  more  spiritual,  and  hope  lives  on  even 
in  captivity.  It  was  indeed  the  voice  of  prophecy  and 
the  belief  in  its  fulfilment  that  sustained  the  captives 
in  Babylon,  and  stimulated  the  pious  under  Ezra  and 
Nehemiah  to  return  to  their  native  land,  and  there, 
cured  finally  of  idolatry,  to  set  up  the  worship  of  God 
with  punctilious  regard  to  the  precepts  of  the  old  law, 
which,  during  their  prosperity,  had  been  slighted. 

Such  is  the  view  presented  in  the  Biblical  books.  It 
involves  a  plan  or  scheme  of  history  of  a  sort.  It  is 
a  record  of  a  religious  movement  proceeding  in  close 
connection  with  certain  alleged  historical  occurrences, 
which  to  the  Biblical  writers  are  of  prime  significance; 
so  that  in  their  estimation  the  different  stadia  in  the 
religious  advance  are  marked  by  definite  events  in 
the  national  life.  I  have  said  that  the  narrative  con- 
tained in  the  Biblical  books  is  ostensibly  consistent  and 
of  one  tenor;  and  the  proof  of  this  is  the  fact  that 
till  recently  no  one  thought  that  any  other  account 
could  be  derived  from  these  books  of  what  the  various 
writers  unanimously  meant  to  represent.  Indeed  those  who 
in  modern  times  think  they  have  proved  that  the  course 
of  the  history  was  different,  do  not  deny  that  the  Biblical 
books,  as  they  lie  before  us,  give  the  account  which  has 
just  been  sketched.  What  they  maintain  is,  that  the 
scheme  of  the  Biblical  writers  is  an  afterthought,  which 
by  a  process  of  manipulation  of  older  documents,  and  by  a 
systematic  representation  of  earlier  events  in  the  light  of 
much  later  times,  has  been  made  to  appear  as  if  it  were 
the  original  and  genuine  development;  and  they  think 
they  are  able,  by  separating  the  early  from  the  late  con- 
stituents of  the  writings,  and  by  a  legitimate  process  of 
criticism,  to  prove  from  the  Biblical  documents  themselves, 


•  Biblical  Theory  criticised.  31 

that  the  liistory  and  the  religious  movement  had  quite  a 
different  course. 

On  purely  literary  and  scientific  grounds  we  cannot  at 
the  outset  refuse  to  entertain  such  a  supposition.  The 
books  of  the  Old  Testament  lie  before  us  as  so  many 
literary  compositions,  and  we  cannot  in  advance  claim 
for  them  such  authority  as  will  bar  any  legitimate 
inquiry  into  their  origin,  and  any  legitimate  criticism  of 
them  as  literary  productions.  It  is  in  itself  a  legitimate 
supposition  that  the  vv^riters  of  the  Old  Testament  books, 
living  and  moving  in  a  narrow  world  of  their  own,  took 
a  circumscribed  view  of  their  national  history,  and  in  a 
simple  unscientific  age  saw  marvels  where  modern  writers 
would  see  only  natural  occurrences.  It  is  also  quite  con- 
ceivable that  Hebrew  writers  of  history,  like  other  his- 
torians, had  their  views  of  past  occurrences  coloured  by 
the  medium  of  their  own  time  through  which  they  regarded 
them,  and  at  a  comparatively  late  time  framed  a  theory 
of  their  past  history,  in  accordance  with  what  succeeding 
events  led  them  to  believe  it  must  have  been.  And  finally, 
it  is  conceivable  that  such  late  writers  should  for  the  first 
time  have  set  themselves  to  put  down  an  account  of  early 
events  from  their  own  standpoint,  or  have  touched  up 
older  documents  in  order  to  make  them  square  with  their 
own  conceptions.  Whether  all  this  was  indeed  the  case 
must  of  course  be  proved  before  we  accept  it;  in  the 
meantime  we  cannot  refuse  to  look  at  it  as  a  hypotheti- 
cal account  of  the  matter.  Nor  need  we  wonder  if,  in 
an  age  like  the  present,  when  the  demand  is  made  in 
every  department  of  investigation  for  scientific  processes 
and  strict  verification  of  facts,  the  theory  of  the  Biblical 
writers  should  be  challenged  to  submit  itself  to  the 
scrutiny  of  nineteenth-century  examination.     Neither  need 


32  Two  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

we  wonder  if  men  who  are  trained  in  the  methods  of 
modern  historical  research,  and  wlio  have  made  the  re- 
ligions of  the  world  a  subject  of  special  study,  have 
sought  to  frame  a  theory  of  Israel's  history  in  accordance 
with  what  they  regard  as  established  scientific  principles. 
Of  course  it  will  be  required  of  the  modern  theory  that 
it  give  a  better  account  of  all  the  facts  of  the  case,  and 
present  on  the  whole  a  more  consistent  and  credible 
explanation  of  the  things  which  are  not  matters  of  dispute. 
We  shall  have  occasion  in  the  sequel  to  consider  the 
main  points  of  the  theory  that  has  been  put  forward  in 
opposition  to  the  Biblical  one.  In  detail  there  are  vari- 
ations in  the  views  held  by  different  writers;  but  in  a 
general  way  the  modern  theory  may  be  stated  as  follows : 
A  number  of  wandering  Hebrew  tribes  came  from  the 
desert  and  found  a  settlement  in  Canaan.  Like  the  races 
around  them  they  had  their  national  God,  Jaliaveh,^  who 
was  to  them  very  much  what  Chemosh  was  to  Moab  or 

^  In  using  this  name  for  the  first  time,  I  must  make  a  brief  explana- 
tion. It  is  now  universally  admitted  that  the  traditional  pronuncia- 
tion, Jehovah,  which  appears  in  our  English  Bible,  is  a  mistake.  By  the 
time  the  vowel-points  were  supplied  to  the  Hebrew  Bible  the  Jews  had 
acquired  the  habit  of  saying  Adhonai,  the  Lord,  wherever  the  sacred 
tetragrammaton  ( JHVH)  occurred,  and  to  guide  to  this  reading  they  wrote 
the  vowels  of  the  name  Adlionai  along  with  the  consonants  of  the  unpro- 
nounced  name.  Taken  as  a  Hebrew  name,  and  vocalised  after  the  analogy 
of  other  words  of  similar  formation,  the  name  should  in  all  probability 
be  pronounced  Yahtlveh  or  Yahveh.  The  objection  to  the  use  of  the  form 
Yahveh  or  Jahveh  is,  that  the  h  in  the  middle  is  apt  to  become  quiescent, 
and  the  word  to  be  pronounced  Ya-veh,  which  is  a  mistake.  I  may  add 
that  whatever  objections  there  may  be  against  deviating  from  a  pronun- 
ciation which  is  invested  with  sacred  associations,  there  are  certain 
advantages,  which  will  appear  as  we  proceed,  in  keeping,  in  a  discus- 
sion like  the  present,  as  near  as  possible  to  the  original.  In  quotations 
from  modern  writers  the  spelling  of  the  respective  authors  is  retained. 
The  origin  and  the  significance  of  the  name  are  considered  in  the  sequel 
(chap,  xi.) 


Modern  Theory  stated^  33 

Milcom  to  Ammon  ;  and  they  possessed  certain  traditions, 
variously  accounted  for,  of  their  origin  and  of  the  manner 
in  which  He  had  become  their  national  God:  but  their 
religious  faith  and  religious  observances  were  very  much 
of  the  same  kind  as  those  of  the  nations  around  them. 
Particularly  from  the  Canaanites,  among  whom  they 
settled,  and  whom  they  gradually  assimilated  or  absorbed, 
they  adopted  many  religious  customs  and  beliefs, — ap- 
propriating their  sacred  places,  making  pilgrimages  to 
their  sacred  tombs,  and  ascribing  to  their  own  ancestors 
the  honours  which  were  paid  by  the  Canaanites  to  local 
heroes  departed.  Custom  grew  into  law,  legend  was 
made  into  history,  and  at  the  time  when  we  have  the 
first  authentic  records  of  them,  they  are  practising  the 
rites  of  a  worship  which  had  grown  up  in  the  way  in- 
dicated, with  conceptions  of  their  national  God  similar 
to  the  beliefs  of  the  neighbouring  nations  regarding  their 
gods.  The  Biblical  books  which  relate  the  history  up 
to  the  eighth  century  B.C.  did  not  exist  in  anything  like 
their  present  form  till  long  after  the  events;  and  it  is 
only  from  early  pieces  contained  in  them,  or  by  various 
inferences,  that  we  can  get  a  true  account  of  the  history 
of  that  time, — the  books  in  their  present  form  being  man- 
ipulated by  later  hands,  and  exhibiting  a  projection  of 
later  ideas  into  past  times.  But  by  the  eighth  century  we 
have  compositions  belonging  to  that  century  itself,  and 
from  that  time  onwards  literary  works  come  to  our  aid 
for  the  understanding  of  the  history.  It  was  to  the 
prophets  that  the  purification  of  the  religious  conceptions 
of  Israel  was  due.  They  first  perceived  and  taught  the 
people  a  higher  truth,  and  by  them  the  ethic  mono- 
theism of  the  Old  Testament  was  developed.  Before 
their  time  "the  nation  had  been   the   ideal  of  religion 

c 


Of  Ti£ai 


34  Tivo  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

in  actual  realisation ;  the  prophets  confronted  the  nation 
with  an  ideal  to  which  it  did  not  correspond.  Then  to 
bridge  over  this  interval  the  abstract  ideal  was  framed 
into  a  law,  and  to  this  law  the  nation  was  to  be  con- 
formed."^ In  this  way  the  code  of  Deuteronomy  was 
prepared  some  short  time  before  the  eighteenth  year  of 
the  reign  of  Josiah,  when  it  is  said  to  have  been  dis- 
covered in  the  Temple.  This  code  of  law  does  not 
therefore  belong  to  the  age  of  Moses,  though  it  is  repre- 
sented as  coming  from  him,  to  give  it  higher  sanction. 
It  was,  in  fact,  the  attempt  to  frame  a  norm  for  the  guid- 
ance of  Israel  in  the  trutli  which  the  propliets  had  taught. 
But  it  had  an  effect  other  than  its  framers  had  antici- 
pated; it  substituted  for  the  free  living  voice  of  God 
speaking  through  His  prophets,  the  voice  of  a  dead  law ; 
and  so,  without  meaning  it,  the  prophets  became  "the 
spiritual  destroyers  of  the  old  Israel."  ^  Law,  therefore, 
was  the  outcome  of  prophecy,  not  its  antecedent ;  and 
it  found  its  ultimate  development  in  the  Levitical  code  of 
Ezra,  which  was  the  starting-point  of  modern  Judaism. 

Without  entering  now  into  any  discussion  of  the  points 
here  raised,  we  may  observe  that  this  theory  professes  to 
expound  the  history  of  Israel  according  to  the  principle 
of  a  continuous  natural  development,  showing  the  gradual 
expansion  of  the  religious  idea  from  the  narrowest  con- 
ceptions of  nationalism,  or  even  animism,  to  that  of  a 
pure  monotheism,  and  the  rise  of  religious  institutions 
from  mere  natural  custom,  often  the  most  superstitious, 
to  codified  law  with  divine  sanctions.  Stade,  a  dis- 
tinguished advocate  of  the  modern  view,  says^  we 
must  at  the  outset  regard  the  religion  of  old  Israel  as 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  491.  2  ibid. 

*  Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel,  vul.  i.  pp.  8,  9. 


The  Theories  contrasted.  35 

in  the  process  of  hecoming,  and  not  entering  the  world  in 
a  completed  form  like  Christianity  or  Mohammedanism. 
Cliristianity,  he  says,  appears  as  a  completed  religion,  just 
because  it  is  the  conclusion  of  the  religion  of  Israel; 
but  we  must  not  apply  to  the  religion  of  Israel  the  maxim 
of  Schleiermacher,  derived  from  a  consideration  of  Chris- 
tianity, that  a  reli.s^ion  is  seen  in  its  greatest  purity  at  its 
source.^  On  which  it  may  be  remarked,  that  whatever 
mistakes  may  have  been  made  on  this  subject  in  the 
"  traditional  view,"  the  Biblical  records  themselves  indi- 
cate very  clearly  a  development  of  its  kind.  The  great 
^ffexence  in  the  two  theories  consists  in  the  germ  from 
which  the  development  took  place,  and  the  stage  of  evo- 
lution that  had  been  reached  in  the  earlier  times  whose^ 
history  we  seek  to  determine. 

We  have,  therefore,  two  opposing  views  of  the  history 
— the  Biblical  view,  set  forth  by  the  Hebrew  historians, 
and  the  view  formulated  by  the  modern  historians  of 
Israel.  The  latter  does  not  hesitate  to  call  the  former 
unhistorical,  and  might  itself  therefore  be  called  the  anti- 
Biblical,  though  I  shall  simply  call  it  the  "  modern  theory." 
I  have  called  them  two  contending  theories,  for  so  they 
are.  The  Old  Testament  historical  books  are  not  bare 
chronicles  of  events.  They  are  animated  by  a  principle, 
in  accordance  with  which  the  writers  profess  to  explain 
the  events.  If  we  suppose  the  accounts  of  early  times 
to  have  been  written  early,  or  if  we  take  the  very  earliest 
of  the  written  sources  which  the  critics  will  admit,  even 
then  they  are  more  than  bare  recitals  of  facts.  There  is 
ever  a  certain  interpretation  of  the  facts,  a  certain  view 
taken  by  the  narrator  which  colours  his  facts  or  guides 
the  disposal  of  them  in  his  recital — a  certain  insight,  true 

1  See  Note  V. 


36  Tico  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

or  false,  which  he  thinks  he  has  into  the  secrets  and 
causes  of  things.    If,  again,  we  suppose  that  these  accounts 
of  early  times  are  written  late,  the  accounts  again  imply 
reflection,  interpretation,  theory.     In  any  case,  there  is 
more  than  the  mere  representation  of  facts.     "  History,  ■ 
as  distinguished  from  chronicles  or  annals,  must  always 
contain  a  theory,  whether  confessed  by  the  writer  or  not 
It  may  not  be  put  prominently  forward,  but  it  lurks  in 
the  pages  and  may  be  read  between  the  lines.     A  sound 
theory  is  simply  a  general  conception,  which  co-ordinates 
and  gives  unity  and  a  causal  relation  to  a  multitude  of ! 
facts.    Without  this,  facts  cease  to  have  interest  except/ 
to  the  antiquarian."^  ^ 

The  state  of  the  case  is  this:  The  history  of  Israel 
ran  through  a  course  of  development  of  some  kind. 
The  Hebrew  writers  had  some  knowledge  of  the  events 
and  crises  of  the  history,  from  personal  experience,  from 
oral  tradition,  from  conviction  engrained  in  the  national 
consciousness,  or  from  written  sources  ;  and  they  set 
themselves,  at  the  time  or  at  some  time,  to,  give  an 
ordered  account  of  the  events.  But  in  any  case,  it  is 
their  view  of  the  history  that  lies  before  us.  Modern 
writers  also  have  knowledge  of  certain  events.  Erom 
the  writings  in  our  hands,  and  from  other  sources,  they 
have  information  of  the  crises  and  outstanding  facts. 
They  have  also  before  them  in  these  books  the  views 
that  the  Biblical  writers  entertained,  and  on  the  strength 
of  all  these  they  write  their  histories  of  Israel.  But, 
again,  it  is  their  interpretation  of  the  events  and  phenom- 
ena that  lies  before  us.  The  date  of  the  written  history 
in  either  case  does  not  in  itself  affect  the  validity  of  the 
theory.     Writers   of  this   nineteenth   Christian   century 

1  Simon  S.  Laurie,  Rise  and  Constitution  of  Universities,  Pref.  p.  vi. 


Test  of  the  two  Theories.  37 

claim  that  tliey  have  the  true  account  to  give  of  the 
matter,  although  they  have  practically  no  additional 
faxits  to  go  upon.  We  cannot  therefore  allow  them,  on 
the  mere  ground  of  lateness,  to  reject  a  theory  which,  let 
us  say,  was  framed  a  few  centuries  before  Christ.  It  may 
be  that  the  early  theory  had  the  more  accurate  insight 
and  gave  the  more  correct  interpretation  of  the  facts  of 
the  history.  The  question  simply  is.  Which  of  the  two 
^theories  gives  on  the  whole  the  better  explanation  of  all 
the  circumstances  which  are  known  and  admitted  ?  There 
is  a  sort  of  higher  criticism  in  either  case,  but  the  theory 
that  is  to  hold  the  field  must  not  only  raise  difficulties 
but  must  lay  them;;and  must,  on  the  view  of  all  the  facts 
of  the  case,  commend  itself,  on  literary  and  critical  and 
common-sense  grounds,  as  the  better  explanation.  There 
is  something  worth  thinking  of  in  the  words  of  Thoreau : 
"  How  comes  it  that  history  never  has  to  wait .  for  facts, 
but  for  a  man  to  write  it  ?  The  ages  may  go  on  forgetting 
the  facts  never  so  long :  he  can  remember  two  for  every 
one  forgotten.  The  musty  records  of  history,  like  the 
catacombs,  contain  the  perishable  remains,  but  only  in 
tlie  breast  of  genius  are  embalmed  the  souls  of  heroes. 
There  is  very  little  of  what  is  called  criticism  here.  It 
is  love  and  reverence,  rather,  which  deal  with  qualities 
not  relatively  but  absolutely  great ;  for  whatever  is  admi- 
rable in  a  man  is  something  infinite,  to  which  he  cannot 
set  bounds.  These  sentiments  allow  the  mortal  to  die, 
the  immortal  and  divine  to  survive."  ^  Now  the  Hebrew 
writers  were  very  far  from  being  dry  annalists,  and  it  is 
quite  possible  that  they,  like  the  evangelists  after  them, 
possessed  those  sentiments  of  love  and  reverence  wlucli_ 
qualified  them  for  being  true  historians, 

^  lleview  of  Thomas  Carlyle. 


38  Two  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

Some  of  the  outstanding  facts  wliicli  have  to  be  ac- 
counted for  have  ah^eady  been  mentioned,  such  as  the 
persistence  of  the  race  and  religion,  the  early  consolida- 
tion of  the  people  around  their  religious  faith,  and  the 
power  of  this  faith  to  produce  two  of  tlie  greatest  re- 
ligions of  the  world.  Other  features  will  meet  us  as  we 
proceed,  such  as  the  high  spiritual  tone  of  the  religion, 
as  early  as  we  can  obtain  contemporaneous  accounts,  and 
the  influence  of  the  prophets,  which,  on  either  theory,  is 
inmiense.  "Tor  all  these  things  there  must  be  found,  if 
possible,  an  adequate  cause  and  sufficient  historical  ex- 
planation. And  even  if  the  accounts  contained  in  the 
Biblical  books  are  pronounced  unhistorical,  we  have  before 
us  a  very  difficult  problem — viz.,  to  explain  how,  at  what 
time,  and  from  what  causes  arose  the  conviction  which 
these  writers  so  firmly  hold,  that  this  was  the  true  course 
of  events.  The  Biblical  historians  say, ''  We  write  thus, 
because  thus  things  occurred."  If  the  anti-Biblical  his- 
torians say,  "  Things  did  not  so  occur,"  they  are  bound, 
among  other  things,  to  give  a  reasonable  explanation  why 
the  Biblical  historians  so  wrote. 

In  a  general  way  we  may  contrast  the  two  theories 
thus  :  Tlie  modern  theory  undertakes  to  trace  the  develop- 
ment of  the  religion  from  the  lowest  stages  of  animistic 
worship  up  to  ethic  monotheism,  and  from  custom  up  to 
authorised  divine  law,  and  this  too  within  the  period  dis- 
tinctively embraced  in  tlie  history  of  Israel  as  a  people. 
The  Biblical  theory  also  posits  a  development;  but  the 
essential  things  whicli  were  finally  reached— a  belief  in 
a  moral  deity,  the  one  ruler  of  the  world,  and  a  law 
divinely  given — -are  there  in  germ  and  substance  to  start 
with  at  the  threshold  of  the  nation's  life.  There  are  low 
stages  of  belief,  there  are  customs  rising  into  laws,  on 


The  Documents  cqipccdcd  to,  39 

Jx)th  theories.     The  difference  lies  in  the  place  assigned 
to  them. 

These  are  the  two  theories  of  the  history,  and  we  have 
before  us  a  mass  of  literature  which  gives  the  sole  or 
the  main  information  which  we  possess  regarding  it,  and 
from  which,  therefore,  is  to  be  obtained  in  some  manner 
the  only  standard  by  which  the  two  tlieories  can  be 
tested.  The  one  theory  has,  let  us  say,  overlaid  itself 
upon  the  books,  or  worked  itself  into  them ;  the  other  has, 
by  critical  processes,  worked  itself  out  of  them.  How 
shall  we  hold  the  balance  between  them  ?  Clearly  we 
must  approach  the  subject  by  its  literary  side :  we  must 
neither,  on  the  one  hand,  invest  the  books  as  a  whole  with 
authority  and  claim  for  them  inspiration,  for  that  would 
be  to  foreclose  the  whole  inquiry,  as  it  would  be  opposed 
to  the  principle  of  Protestantism ;  ^  nor  must  we,  on  the 
other  hand,  summarily  reject  books  or  portions  of  them 
on  merely  subjective  grounds,  saying  that  such  and  such 
parts  represent  later  and  unhistorical  views,  or  arbi- 
ti-arily  set  aside  as  unhistorical  everything  in  whicli 
there  is  a  miraculous  element.  The  books  are  our  only 
witnesses — the  only  materials  we  have  for  forming  our 
conclusions.  This  has  been  well  put  by  Kuenen  himself: 
"  The  Bible  is  in  every  one's  hand.  The  critic  has  no 
other  Bible  than  the  public.  He  does  not  profess  to  have 
any  additional  documents,  inaccessible  to  the  laity,  nor 
does  he  profess  to  find  anything  in  his  Bible  that  the 
ordinary  reader  cannot  see.  It  is  true  that  here  and  there 
he  improves  the  common  translation ;  but  this  is  the  ex- 
ception, not  the  rule.  And  yet  he  dares  to  form  a  con- 
ception of  Israel's  religious  development  totally  different 
from  that  which,  as  any  one  may  see,  is  set  forth  in  the 

1  See  Briggs,  Biblical  Study,  p.  106  ff.  ;  Whither  ?  p.  73  ff 


4  0  Tiuo  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

Old  Testament,  and  to  sketch  the  primitive  Christianity 
in  lines  which  even  the  acutest  reader  cannot  recognise  in 
the  New."  ^  Since,  however,  the  critics  undertake  so 
much,  we  must  stipulate  that  their  criticism  shall  be  fair. 
They  must  not  criticise  the  books  away  altogether.  The 
books  are  the  materials  out  of  which  the  structure  of  the 
history  is  to  be  built,  not  a  mere  scaffolding,  within  which 
out  of  other  materials — say  of  a  purely  subjective  char- 
acter— the  building  is  to  rise.  When  all  is  done,  the 
books  should  appear  more  valuable  as  parts  of  a  compact 
whole;  and  even  the  late  parts,  when  proved  to  be  late, 
ought  to  fall  into  their  proper  place,  and  add  symmetry  to 
the  structure. 

Here  then,  manifestly,  a  difficulty  in  procedure  presents 
itself.  The  Biblical  theory  is  formulated  in  the  books  as 
they  lie  before  us.  The  modern  historians  do  not  deny 
this,  but  maintain  that  the  parts  of  the  books  in  which 
the  theory  finds  expression  are  not  trustworthy  docu- 
ments, but  are  of  late  origin,  and  give  expression  to  late 
views.  Both  theories  profess  to  be  supported  by  the  same 
books,  but  they  imply  different  views  of  the  books. 

In  order  to  have  a  clear  point  of  departure  and  a  fair 
start  in  the  inquiry,  it  is  essential  that  there  should  be 
some  position  on  which  both  parties  in  the  controversy 
are  agreed,  if  only  for  a  moment,  before  diverging  so 
widely  as  they  ultimately  do — some  determinative  fact  or 
facts  which  shall  not  be  disputed,  the  evidence  of  which 
shall  neither  be  assumed  in  advance  nor  called  in  question 
at  a  later  stage.  If  certain  witnesses  are  suspected,  wo 
must  either  sift  their  testimony,  or  fall  back  upon  wit- 
nesses whose  word  is  beyond  question. 

Now  the  main  point  in  dispute  is  as  to  the  history  of 

^  Modern  Review,  July  1880.     Comp.  National  Religions,  &c.,  p.  69  f. 


Method  of  Procedure.  ~  41 

religious  belief  and  practice  in  the  earlier  period,  particu- 
larly the  period  from  Moses  to  the  time  when,  as  is  ad- 
mitted on  both  sides,  we  have  the  contemporary  writings 
of  prophets.  But  this  is  the  very  period  as  to  which  tlie 
modern  theory  says  the  books  give  no  reliable  history. 
The  narratives  contained  in  the  Pentateuch,  which  osten- 
sibly exhibit  the  earlier  phases  of  the  religion,  are,  they 
say,  not  history  at  all,  but  merely  an  account  of  what 
later  writers  fancied  the  early  history  must  have  or  should 
have  been,  and  represent  only  their  views,  and  reflect 
their  times.  It  might  seem,  therefore,  a  natural  course  at 
this  point  to  set  ourselves  to  a  critical  examination  of 
these  productions  in  particular,  so  as  to  eliminate  from 
them  the  credible  element,  in  the  shape  of  a  substratum 
of  fact,  and  thus  obtain  reliable  materials  for  that  period 
of  the  history.  This,  in  fact,  has  been  the  method  usually 
followed  by  those  who  have  undertaken  recent  histories  of 
Israel — to  criticise  or  verify  the  sources.  It  is  a  tedious, 
and  in  some  respects  a  dreary  process,  as  may  be  seen 
by  turning  over  the  pages  of  such  a  work  as  Kuenen's 
*  Hexateuch.'  How  far  the  critics  have  been  success- 
ful in  their  work  I  shall  not  now  stop  to  inquire, 
because,  in  order  to  reach  the  end  before  us,  I  believe 
that  there  is  another  and  surer  way,  which  will  enable 
us  to  dispense  with  so  laborious  an  investigation.  There 
are  three  practical  reasons  which  I  think  sufficient  to 
justify  the  course  which  I  propose  to  pursue.  They  are 
these : — 

1.  The  merely  critical  process  of  examination  of  the 
documents  in  question  is  not  decisive  for  the  purpose  of 
giving  us  an  undisputed  starting-point.  Even  if  it  be 
granted  that  critics  have  succeeded  in  separating  the  com- 
ponent parts  of  the  Hexateuch,  there  remains  the  deter- 


42  Tioo  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

mination  of  tlieir  order  and  respective  dates,  and  the 
degree  in  which  they  are  dependent  one  upon  another. 
When  it  comes  to  the  settlement  of  these  points,  recourse 
is  had  to  a  hypothesis  of  the  manner  in  which  the  develop- 
ment of  the  history  took  place ;  and  different  critics,  even 
when  they  agree  in  the  main  as  to  the  separation  of  the 
sources,  give  very  different  accounts  of  the  time  and  manner 
in  which  they  came  together.  Kuenen  himself  admits  the 
point  for  which  I  am  contending.^"  In  giving  a  history  of 
"the  criticism,  he  says  that  up  to  the  time  of  Bleek,  when 
critics  sought  on  purely  literary  grounds  to  determine  the 
order  of  composition  of  the  sources,  there  was  no  certain 
result  attained;  and  that  it  was  only  when  tlie  aid  of 
"  historical  criticism  "  was  called  in  tliat  an  arrangement  of 
these  was  possible.^  The  most  striking  proof  of  the  mat- 
ter is,  that  one  element  of  tlie  Hexateuch,  the  so-called 
fundamental  writing  or  priestly  document,  which  was  on 
all  hands  set  down  as  the  earliest  of  the  sources,  is  now 
by  the  Grafian  hypothesis  made  the  very  latest ;  and  the 
only  reason  for  this  change  of  view  is  the  introduction  of 
the  hypothesis  as  to  the  course  of  the  history.  There  is 
thus  always  a  certain  amount  of  reasoning  in  a  circle,  the 
theory  of  the  history  being  introduced  to  determine  the 
dates  and  orders  of  the  documents,  which  otherwise  could 
not  be  determined ;  while  the  books  themselves,  rearranged 
according  to  this  hypothesis,  are  appealed  to  as  proofs  of 
the  new  theory  of  the  history.  Of  course  it  is  maintained 
that  tlie  theory  of  the  history  can  be  and  is  proved  on 
other  grounds  ;  that  the  succession  of  the  elements  in  de- 
tail is  fixed  by  "  reference  to  an  independent  standard — 
namely,  the  inner  development  of  the  history  of  Israel,  so 

^  Kuenen,  The  Five  Books  of  Moses,  a  Lecture  delivered  at  Haarlem, 
1870,  translated  by  John  Muir,  1877,  p.  7  f. 


Traditional  View  of  the  Pcntateucli.  43 

far  as  that  is  known  to  us  by  trustworthy  testimonies  from 
independent  sources."^  So  be  it;  we  shall  see  by-and-by 
on  what  independent  grounds  it  rests.  My  point  at 
present  is,  that  we  cannot  at  the  outset  debate  it  on  the 
ground  of  the  Pentateuch,  where  confessedly  it  cannot  be 
settled. 

2.  The  Biblical  theory  does  not  depend  upon  the  author- 
ship and  mode  of  composition  of  the  Hexateuch.  It  is 
indeed  often  assumed  on  both  sides  that  it  does ;  and  the 
critics  usually  combat  "the  traditional  theory," ^  as  it  is 
called,  on  this  subject.  It  is  important,  therefore,  that  we 
should  see  exactly  how  this  matter  stands,  so  that  the 
Biblical  theory  may  have  fair  play,  and  may  not  be, 
weighted  with  what  is  not  a  part  of  it. 

It  is  certainly  the  case  that  the  tradition  of  the  Jewish 
Synagogue,  followed  without  scrutiny  by  the  Christian 
Church,  was  to  the  effect  that  the  Pentateuch  was  sub- 
stantially written  by  Moses.  By  the  time  that  the  books 
of  the  Old  Testament  were  collected  into  a  Canon — how 
much  earlier  we  cannot  tell — the  five  books  forming  tlie 
Pentateuch  had  come  to  be  spoken  of  as  the  Law  of  Moses, 
or  the  Book  of  the  Law  of  Moses.  This  was  natural  enough, 
since  they  contained  as  a  main  element  the  Law  wliicli 
tlie  nation  accepted  as  of  Mosaic  origin.  These  books 
have  indeed  as  much  right  to  be  called  the  books  of  Moses, 
as  the  books  of  Joshua,  Judges,  or  Samuel  to  be  named  as 
tliey  are.  Whatever  may  have  been  the  view  of  those 
who  first  collected  the  Canon  as  to  the  share  Moses  had 
in  the  composition  of  these  books,  in  point  of  fact  we  find 
the  Jewish  tradition  on  this  subject,  as  early  as  we  can 
trace  it,  assigning  to  him  the  authorship.  The  time  of 
modern  literary  criticism  was  not  yet,  and  probably  those 

■    1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  12.  ^  See  Note  IV. 


44  Two  Contending  Theories  of  the  History, 

who  gave  utterance  to  the  dictum  did  not  think  what  it 
involved.  In  proof  of  the  loose  way  in  which  the  Mosaic 
authorship  of  the  Pentateuch  was  held,  we  may  refer  to 
the  tradition,  equally  persistent  and  not  considered  incon- 
sistent with  the  other,  that  Ezra  "  restored  the  Law ; "  ^  or 
even  to  the  belief  current  at  an  early  time  that  he  re- 
wrote the  whole  Old  Testament.^  The  account  which  the 
Talmudists  give  of  the  composition  and  authorship  of  all 
the  books,  shows  how  little  they  actually  knew  about  the 
matter.  The  truth  is,  that  the  tradition  was  of  a  general 
kind,  and  the  matter  is  one  in  which  we  cannot  rely  on 
tradition  for  the  j)reservation  of  exact  details.  And  so  the 
Christian  Church,  in  accepting  the  canonical  books  of  the 
Old  Testament,  accepted  also  without  question  and  with- 
out reflection  the  current  traditions  as  to  their  authorship. 
In  point  of  fact,  however,  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch, 
like  the  historical  books  wliich  follow  them,  are  anony- 
mous. The  book  of  Genesis  gives  no  hint  of  its  author- 
ship, neither  does  the  book  of  Leviticus;  and  the  few 
passages  found  in  the  other  books  which  speak  of  Moses 
writing  such  and  such  things  "in  a  book,"  will  be  discov- 
ered on  examination  to  refer  to  certain  specific  things. 
Indeed  the  very  fact  of  such  expressions  occurring  within 
the  books  may  even  be  taken  as  a  presumption  that  it 
was  not  he  who  wrote  the  whole. 

The  "  traditional "  adherence  to  the  Mosaic  authorship  of 
the  Pentateuch  has  caused  no  little  confusion.  For  when 
it  was  seen  that  there  were  certain  things  that  could  not 
possibly  have  been  written  by  him,  and  when  the  composite 
character  of  the  books  was  pointed  out,  it  was  thought  that 
the  credibility  of  the  books  was  destroyed  ;  alarm  was  felt 

1  See  Note  VI. 

*  See  Robertson  Smith,  Old  Testament  in  the  Jewish  Church,  p.  155. 


Illsioric  Value  not  dependent  on  Date.  45 

on  one  side  lest  the  authority  of  Scripture  should  be  under- 
mined, and  on  the  other  side  it  was  triumphantly  asserted 
that  the  books  were  of  no  historical  value  because  they 
were  not  contemporary  compositions.  Both  positions  are 
untenable.  (1.)  Xhe__ historical  value  of  these  books  does 
not  depend  on  their  being  written  by  Moses,  or  indeed  on 
our  knowing  who  the  author  was.  Suppose  the  books 
had  borne  on  their  face  that  Moses  was  their  author,  the 
books  themselves  give  us  almost  all  the  information  we 
possess  as  to  Moses ;  and  from  them,  therefore,  alone,  we 
can  judge  whether  he  was  likely  to  give  us  a  true  history. 
We  should  be  again  reasoning  in  a  circle;  proving  the 
truth  of  the  books  on  the  authority  of  Moses,  and  proving 
the  existence  and  activity  of  Moses  on  the  authority  of 
the  books.  And  if  the  credibility  of  the  books  is  to  be 
made  dependent  on  our  knowing  the  author,  on  what 
grounds  are  we  to  believe  the  succeeding  books  whose 
authors  are  entirely  unknown  ?  (2.)  On  tlie  other  hand, 
the  critics  would  not  have  been  likely  to  accept  the  state- 
ments of  books  such  as  these  are,  even  had  it  been  proved 
that  they  were  written  by  Moses  or  some  contemporary  of 
his.  They  would  have  reserved  to  themselves  the  right 
of  rejecting  or  accepting  on  internal  grounds  the  history 
recorded.  For  example,  Kuenen,  speaking  of  Islam, 
laments  the  deficiency  of  information  just  at  the  points 
where  it  would  be  most  valuable,  and  says  "  the  tradition 
is  coloured  throughout  by  the  dogmatic  convictions  of  the 
first  believers,  and  is  often  open  to  the  gravest  suspicion."  ^ 
Just  so ;  even  if  it  were  demonstrated  to  a  certainty  that 
Moses  wrote  the  Pentateuch,  that  would  not  make  the 
critical  school  a  whit  more  ready  to  accept  its  statements. 
The  course  of  New  Testament  criticism  furnishes  an  illus- 

^  National  Religions,  p.  10  f. 


46  Tico  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

tration  of  what  is  possible  in  a  case  like  tliis.  Though 
the  Gospels  are  proved  to  be  of  so  early  a  date  that  the 
writers  could  have  had  knowledge  of  the  things  they  pro- 
fess to  relate,  the  modern  advanced  critics  of  the  New 
Testament  do  not  feel  themselves  bound  on  that  account 
to  receive  the  books  as  historical.  They  have  to  make 
allowance  for  the  bias  of  the  writer  even  when  the  writer 
is  a  contemporary ;  and  if  he  relates  events  which  they 
consider  cannot  have  occurred,  his  account  is  rejected  as 
i^icredible.  Critics  of  the  Old  Testament  are  in  the  habit 
— as  we  shall  see — of  treating  documents  and  writers  in 
the  same  way,  altogether  irrespective  of  whether  these 
are  contemporaneous  or  not;  and  therefore  little  value 
should  be  placed  on  a  contention  coming  from  their  side, 
that  if  the  Mosaic  origin  of  the  Pentateuch  is  disproved, 
its  historical  value  is  affected.  In  other  words,  critics 
would  not  accept  the  Pentateuch  as  historical,  even  if  it 
were  proved  that  Moses  was  the  author. 

It  seems  to  be  too  readily  assumed  and  too  readily 
admitted,  that  contemporaneousness  and  credibility  of 
documents  are  necessarily  inseparable,  or  to  be  inferred 
as  a  matter  of  course  one  from  the  other.  A  moment's 
reflection  will  show  that  an  event  may  have  historically 
occurred,  and  that  we  may  have  good  evidence  of  it, 
eve]i  although  no  account  of  it  was  written  down  at  the 
moment  of  its  occurrence;  as  also  that  false  statements 
in  regard  to  certain  matters  of  fact  may  be  made,  and  put 
on  record  at  the  time  of  the  actual  occurrences.  The 
mere  writing  down  of  these  at  the  time  does  not  make 
them  credible,  nor  does  the  omission  to  write  those  make 
them  incredible.  Assyrian  and  Egyptian  kings  may  lie' 
upon  stone  monuments  —  very  probably  they  did  —  in 
regard  to  events  of  their   own   day;   and   Hebrew   his- 


Modern  Theory  ean  he  viciced  as  a  whole,  47 

torians  may  tell  us  a  true  story  of  their  history  though 
tiiey  wrote  it  long  after  the  events.^ 

The  point  to  he  establislied  is,  that  for  the  Biblical 
theory  of  the  history  it  does  not  matter  who  wrote  the 
historical  books.  The  theory  does  indeed  imply  that 
those  books  contain  true  history;  but  its  acceptance  of 
the  facts  does  not  depend  on  a  knowledge  of  who  wrote 
them  down;  for  on  this  point  the  books  themselves  are 
for  the  most  part  silent.  Moses  may  have  written  much, 
or  may  have  written  little,  of  what  is  contained  in  the 
Pentateuch ;  it  will  remain  unknown  who  were  the 
authors  of  the  succeeding  books :  our  knowledge  of  these 
things  would  not  necessarily  guarantee  the  history.  The 
Biblical  theory,  as  an  account  of  the  manner  in  which 
things  took  place,  does  not  stand  or  fall  by  the  determina- 
tion of  the  contemporaneousness  of  documents,  and  the 
modern  theory  certainly  has  no  higher  claim  to  the  pos- 
session of  contemporary  sources  for  its  support. 

3.  And  thirdly,  the  modern  theory,  like  the  Biblical,  is 
now  formulated  in  such  a  shape  that  it  can  be  taken  as 
a  whole,  and  tested  on  grounds  that  lie  apart  from  ques- 
tions of  the  authorship  of  the  books  of  the  Hexateuch. 
There  are  certain  admitted  facts ;  at  a  certain  point  we 
come  upon  ground  that  is  undisputed ;  some  outstanding 
facts  and  phenomena  of  the  history  are  before  us;  and 
each  theory  in  turn  gives  its  account  of  the  origin  and 
significance  of  these  facts  and  phenomena.  At  a  certain 
time  we  emerge  upon  the  ground  of  admitted  history, 
when  contemporaneous  writings  come  to  our  aid,  for  the 
determination  of  conditions  and  circumstances  which  have 
a  clear  significance  for  the  history ;  and  it  becomes  pos- 
sible by  an  examination  of  the  two  theories  to  determine 

1  See  Note  VII. 


48    '         Tivo  Contending  Theories  of  the  History. 

which  of  them  answers  the  more  accurately  to  those  con- 
ditions and  circumstances,  and  so  fits  in  the  more  accu- 
rately to  the  course  of  the  history  at  a  point  which  is 
undisputed. 

What  is  here  proposed,  therefore,  is  to  leave  entirely 
out  of  account  in  the  first  place  those  books  or  parts  of 
books  which  are  declared  to  be  unhistorical,  and  to  come 
to  a  time  at  which  both  theories  agree  that  we  are  on 
clear  historical  ground.  Tlie  critical  historians  shall  bo 
allowed,  provisionally,  to  indicate  what  that  period  is ; 
they  shall  also  be  allowed  to  indicate  the  writings  which 
belong  to  that  period ;  and  without  passing  judgment 
upon  the  selection,  but  merely  viewing  the  whole  theory 
as  a  hypothesis,  we  shall  leave  challenged  witnesses  en- 
tirely in  the  background,  and  question  those  who  are 
brought  forward  as  trustworthy.  We  shall  try  to  discover 
what  testimony  they  afford  in  regard  to  certain  distinctive 
points  of  the  two  theories,  and  to  find  in  which  direction 
the  truth  lies.  There  are  certain  great  turning-points,  and 
outstanding  phenomena  which  are  explained  differently 
by  the  two  theories.  So  far  as  these  fall  within  a  sphere 
where  we  have  trustworthy  evidence,  we  shall  examine 
the  witnesses  as  to  their  significance,  and  in  every  case 
shall  seek  to  proceed  from  the  known  and  admitted  to 
the  less  known  or  unknown  or  disputed.  We  shall  not 
claim  authority  or  inspiration  for  any  of  the  writings,  but 
shall  insist  that  they  be  taken  in  hand  fide,  and  inter- 
preted by  a  fair  and  common-sense  criticism.  If  the 
claim  to  authority  is  not  pressed  on  the  one  side,  the 
claim  of  subjective  or  theoretical  criticism  is  to  be  dis- 
allowed on  the  other.  We  must  have  some  dona  fide 
witnesses  to  start  with,  or  no  progress  is  possible.  If  the 
only  witnesses  available  turn  out  to  be  unworthy  of  ere- 


Historic  Criticism.  49 

dence,  it  is  difficult  to  see  how  any  conclusion  at  all  can 
be  arrived  at  which  may  be  regarded  as  safe. 

By  thus  testing  the  two  theories  according  to  a  standard 
which  is  accepted,  and  on  ground  which  is  undisputed,  we 
shall  obtain  some  means  of  estimating  the  value  of  those 
other  witnesses  also,  who  at  the  outset  are  held  in  the 
background.     For  if  the  Biblical  theory  can  sustain  itself 
on  independent  ground,  it  is  evident  that  those  challenged  \ 
witnesses  who  are  in  its  favour  will  have  to  be  regarded  \ 
as  credible  testimony ;  in  other  words,  if  apart  from  the    j 
historical  books  which  are  disputed  the  Biblical  theory  is  I 
established,  then  those  books  or  portions  of  them  which  / 
proceed  on  the  Biblical  theory  fall  into  their  proper  place  [^ 
as  history.     If  by  purely  historical  inquiry  we  can  deter- 
mine the  main  line  and  trend  of  the  history,  then  it  will 
be  safe  to  criticise  the  documents  by  literary  methods,  so 
as   to   determine   earlier   and   later  elements,  separating 
duplicates,  and  so  forth,  but  always  with  regard  to  the 
historical  line  that  has  been  ascertained.     This  is  more 
scientific  than  positing  a  hypothetical  line  of  development, 
and  then  trying  to  make  the  materials  square  with  it,  or 
arranging  them  to  suit  it.     If  it  is  only  on  the  basis  of 
a  historical  criticism  that  the  arrangement  of  the  materials 
can  be  made,  the  historical  scheme  should,  if  possible,  be 
determined  on  independent  grounds,  and  not  put  forth  at 
the  outset  as  hypothetical. 


5C 


CHAPTEE    III. 

WRITINGS  OF  THE  NINTH  AND   EIGHTH   CENTURIES  B.C. 
AS  LITERARY  AND  AS  RELIGIOUS   PRODUCTS. 

The  limitations  imposed  on  our  inquiry  compel  us  to  find  a  neutral  and 
itndisputed  starting-point — We  accept  the  century  850  to  750  B.C., 
within  which  fall  the  earliest  writing  prophets^  as  well  as  certain  other 
compositions  which  are  assigned  to  this  period —  Value  of  contemporary 
documents — Enumeration  of  the  loritings  admitted,  and  statement  of  the 
problem — First  of  all,  the  existence  of  a  varied  literature  in  this  one 
century  has  to  be  explained — Writing  implies  reading  and  education 
of  some  hind  and  duration — Secondly,  as  religious  products  the  writings 
call  for  explanation — The  utterances  of  the  earliest  writing  projjhets, 
and  their  being  addressed  to  the  people,  inconsistent  with  the  idea  that 
it  is  a  time  of  rudimentary  religious  ideas — Conclusion  that  this  'period 
is  neither  the  earliest  literary  age  nor  the  time  of  commencement  of  the 
prophetic  religion. 

It  follows,  from  the  limitation  we  have  set  to  our  inquiry 
in  the  preceding  chapter,  that  we  cannot  now  proceed,  as 
would  otherwise  be  convenient,  to  trace  the  history  of  the 
religion  of  Israel  downwards  in  a  connected  way  from  the 
earliest  times.  We  must  take  our  stand,  at  the  com- 
mencement of  our  inquiry,  upon  common  and  undisputed 
ground.  In  order  to  have  such  a  starting-point,  we  fix 
upon  the  period  when  the  modern  historians  say  we  have 
authentic  written  information  —  viz.,  the  pei'iod  within 


Start  from  undisputed  Ground.  51 

wliicli  fall  the  earliest  writing  propliets,  Amos  and  Hosea. 
With  them  we  have  contemporary  accounts,  so  far  as  they 
go,  of  the  religious  beliefs  of  Israel ;  and  from  their  writ- 
ings as  well  as  other  compositions,  which  we  are  allowed 
to  use  as  belonging  to  about  the  same  age,  we  shall  obtain, 
in  the  first  place,  those  views,  at  least,  which  writers  of 
that  time  held.  And  then,  from  the  known  and  admitted,^ 
we  must  seek  to  determine,  as  best  we  can,  the  unknown  or; 
disputed.  The  discussion  will  thus  be  very  much  simpli- 
fied ;  for  it  will  not  be  legitimate  for  either  party  to  take 
shelter  behind  any  preconceived  theory,  either  of  the  in- 
spiration, authority,  and  sequence  of  books,  or  of  a  certain 
course  of  historical  development.  If  there  is  a  disadvan- 
tage in  being  deprived  of  contemporary  written  authority 
for  an  early  period  which  we  wish  to  determine,  the 
disadvantage  will  lie  equally  against  both  sides.  We 
shall  be  compelled  to  fix  our  attention  on  certain  facts 
which  are  admitted,  and  by  a  process  of  inference,  which 
must  be  closely  watched,  to  make  our  way  back  to  ante- 
cedent facts  and  situations. 

The  value  of  contemporary  writings  in  a  discussion  of 
this  kind  is  immense.  From  them  we  obtain  a  firm 
ground  from  which  to  start,  for  we  derive  information  as 
to  the  conditions  of  thought  and  life  at  the  time  of  the 
writers  in  hand.  We  are  enabled  to  perceive  not  only 
the  ideas  of  the  writers  themselves,  but  the  conceptions 
and  practices  that  were  current  in  their  time,  so  far  as  the 
writers  have  occasion  to  touch  upon  them.  The  writings 
of  the  prophets  aro  in  this  respect  particularly  valuable ; 
for  these  teachers  were  pre-eminently  men  of  their  time, 
addressing  themselves  directly  to  the  situations  in  which 
they  were  placed,  and  appealing  to  the  consciousness  of 
the  people  by  whom  they  were  surrounded. 


Of   Ti 


52       Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

It  would  be  a  mistake,  however,  to  limit  the  value  of 
contemporary  writings  to  the  mere  information  they  give 
in  regard  to  contemporary  conditions.  A  writer  is  indeed 
the  child  of  his  age,  but  his  age  is  the  product  of  ante- 
cedent influences ;  and  unless  we  can  from  contemporary 
writings  find  our  way  by  safe  inference  to  the  causes  that 
exerted  them,  we  shall  never  make  any  progress.  His- 
tories of  Israel  written  in  this  nineteenth  Christian  century 
reflect  the  spirit  of  the  age ;  but  their  authors  would  not 
like  to  have  them  set  aside  as  merely  tlie  afterthoughts 
of  modern  speculation  projected  backward  into  a  distant 
time.  And  the  writings  of  prophetical  men,  in  the  same 
way,  are  more  than  the  expression  of  their  own  reflections. 
We  must  account  for  the  turn  which  their  reflections 
took,  for  the  standpoint  which  they  had  readied;  the 
men  and  their  writings  are  historical  facts  which  are  to 
be  historically  explained.  And  as  they  were  not  osten- 
sibly historians,  any  information  they  give  us  as  to  the 
history  will  be  the  more  free  from  suspicion  of  tendency 
or  bias. 

The  great  point  in  this  discussion  is  to  determine  as 
clearly  as  possible  the  religion  of  Israel  in  the  period 
preceding  the  earliest  writing  prophets.  This  period  is 
frequently  spoken  of  in  modern  works  as  the  "  pre- 
prophetic  period";  but  this  mode  of  speaking  requires 
qualification.  To  say  the  "  pre-prophetic  "  religion  of  Israel, 
is  liable  to  involve  the  assumption  that  the  writing  pro- 
phets differed  in  their  teaching  from  tliose  that  preceded 
them,  which  is  just  the  point  in  dispute.  We  are  not 
entitled  at  the  outset  to  assume  that  the  prophetic  period, 
as  a  stadium  in  the  religious  history  of  Israel,  begins  with 
the  prophets  whose  writings  have  come  down  to  us ;  and 
therefore  the   expression,  although   convenient  in   some 


Tlie  Writings  specified.  53 

respects,  should  not  be  employed  without  this  necessary 
qualification. 

Let  us  now  endeavour  to  gain  some  idea  of  the  period 
at  which  we  have  agreed  to  take  our  stand,  and  which  may 
be  roughly  stated  as  the  century  850  to  750  B.C.  Though 
it  is  maintained  that  this  is  the  earliest  historical  standing- 
ground  in  Israel's  history,  it  is,  according  to  the  Biblical 
account,  comparatively  late;  and  in  point  of  fact,  it  is 
not  disputed  on  the  other  side  that  a  great  many  im- 
portant historical  events  had  already  happened.  By  the 
eighth  century  before  Christ,  the  northern  kingdom  of 
the  ten  tribes  had  reached  the  culmination  of  its  great- 
ness, from  which  it  rapidly  declined  to  its  fall.  Amos 
prophesied  in  the  time  of  Jeroboam  II.,  in  the  first 
half  of  the  eighth  century — i.e.,  before  750  B.C.;  and 
Hosea  probably  lived  till  near  the  ruin  of  the  kingdom. 
Though  the  books  of  the  Kings  were  not  written  till  long 
after,  and  therefore  cannot,  with  the  limitations  we  have 
imposed  upon  our  inquiry,  be  relied  upon  for  the  inter- 
pretation  they  x^ut  upon  the  events,  yet  the  succession  of 
rulers  in  the  two  kingdoms  as  the  books  give  them,  as 
well  as  the  separation  of  the  two  kingdoms  in  the  reign 
of  Eehoboam,  and  in  general  the, simple  facts  of  the  his- 
tory as  there  recorded,  are  accepted.  Moreover,  there  are 
certain  compositions  which  are  admitted  as  existing  in  or 
belonging  to  the  same  age.  The  stories  of  the  patriarchs 
as  given  in  the  Jehovistic  portions  of  the  book  of  Gene- 
sis;^ the  accounts  of  the  doings  and  sayings  of  Elijah 
and  Elisha  which  have  become  embodied  in  the  books 
of  Kings,  are  admitted  to  have  been  committed  to  writ- 
ing in  this  period ;  and  though  they  are  not  to  be 
accepted  as  history — the  stories  of  the.  patriarchs  iu  par- 
1  See  Note  YIII. 


54       Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

ticular — yet  they  may  be  taken  as  embodying  the  ideas 
of  the  men  who  committed  them  to  writing,  and  they  are 
thus  at  least  materials  for  judging  of  the  views  which  at 
this  time  were  entertained.  Furthermore,  it  is  not  denied 
that  in  the  book  of  Judges — later  editorial  interpreta- 
tions excepted — we  have  a  pretty  accurate  description  of 
the  time  to  which  it  refers;  and  that  the  books  of 
Samuel  —  later  glosses  again  excepted  —  relate  certain 
facts  as  to  the  activity  of  Samuel,  and  the  setting  up  of 
the  kingdom.  Lastly,  although  the  book  of  Deuteronomy 
was  not  yet  in  existence,  nor  the  Code  of  Laws  and 
accompanying  narrative  of  the  books  of  Exodus,  Leviticus, 
and  Numbers,  yet  there  existed  a  brief  written  Code, 
the  so-called  Book  of  the  Covenant  contained  in  Exodus 
xx.-xxiii.  It  is,  however,  necessary  to  add,  that  though 
these  writings  are  admitted  to  belong  to  the  periods 
respectively  stated,  their  historical  value,  it  is  main- 
tained, can  only  be  determined  by  the  most  careful 
criticism;  and  historical  critics  are  very  much  divided 
among  themselves  as  to  the  positive  residuum  of  truth 
underlying  them. 

These  then,  roughly  speaking,  are  the  authorities  at  our 
disposal  for  the  inquiry.  Later  writings,  of  course,  which 
are  undisputed,  such  as  the  prophecies  of  Micah,  Isaiah, 
Jeremiah,  and  bare  facts  of  history  which  are  not  denied, 
may  be  referred  to  if  there  is  occasion.  But  we  are  not 
to  appeal  to  those  so-called  later  "  summaries  "  or  reviews  ^ 
of  the  history,  and  what  are  regarded  as  interpretations  of 
it  in  the  light  of  later  ideas,  which  the  Biblical  historians 
have,  in  certain  places,  superimposed  upon  earlier  authen- 
tic documents.  The  ultimate  point  we  wish  to  determine, 
by  the  aid  of  these  authorities,  is  this.  What  actually  was 

1  See  below,  p.  116. 


The  Writings  as  Literary  Products.  65 

the  religion  of  Israel,  in  its  various  aspects  of  belief  and 
practice,  in  the  times  'preceding  the  authorities  to  which 
we  appeal,  and  how  far  back  can  be  traced  the  beliefs 
which  we  find  prevailing  in  undisputed  historic  times  ? 
And  the  only  way,  it  seems  to  me,  by  which  we  can  reach 
a  settlement  of  this  question  is  to  determine,  in  the  first 
place,  what  the  undisputed  authorities  say  for  themselves, 
as  to  their  own  time,  and  then  byinference  to  work  our 
way  back  to  an  earlier  time  and  condition  of  things. 

Having  restricted  ourselves  to  the  very  narrowest 
grounds,  we  need  not  expect  to  find  full  information  on 
all  the  points  which  we  desire  to  determine.  We  may 
have  to  be  content  with  brief  hints,  and  may  have  to 
draw  our  inferences  from  a  few  texts.  In  any  case,  we 
shall  have  to  be  satisfied  with  general  conclusions.  But, 
by  shifting  our  point  of  view,  and  starting  various  lines 
of  inquiry,  we  should  be  able  to  discover  whether  there  is 
a  concurrent  testimony  to  the  one  theory  or  the  other, 
and  to  determine  in  which  direction  generally  the  truth 
lies.  And  since  every  positive  fact  that  is  available  has 
its  significance  in  such  an  investigation,  I  begin  with  the 
most  patent  fact  of  all — the  existence  of  these  writings, 
which  are  placed  in  our  hands  as  materials  for  the  solu- 
tion of  the  problem.  Without  asking  in  the  meantime 
what  the  contents  of  the  writings  are,  here  is  a  hard  fact 
— that  writings  do  exist  at  the  period  from  which  we 
start.  Let  us  see  whether  we  can  draw  any  conclusions 
from  this  mere  fact ;  and  for  this  purpose  let  us  look  at 
them,  first,  as  mere  literary  products,  and  secondly,  as 
religious  compositions. 

I.  I  propose,  therefore,  first  of  all,  to  look  at  the  com- 
positions now  before  us  in  their  literary  character.  As  so 
many  compositions  belonging,  according  to  the  hypothesis, 


56        Writing's  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

all  to  one  age,  tliey  are  well  worthy  of  close  scrutiny. 
Their  very  existence  ought  to  tell  us  something,  and,  if 
possible,  we  ought  to  get  some  account  of  their  produc- 
tion. Amos  informs  us  he  was  one  of  the  herdmen  of 
Tekoa,  This  was  a  town  or  village  some  twelve  miles 
south  of  Jerusalem,  and  bordering  on  the  desert  pasture- 
land,  so  that  he  is  a  native  of  the  southern  kingdom.  He 
was  not  a  "  prophet  nor  the  son  of  a  prophet " — i.e.,  he 
did  not  belong  to  what  we  may  call  now  the  professional 
class  of  prophets,  but  was  in  fact  a  common  man,  not 
necessarily  poor,  but  presumably  not  in  high  social  posi- 
tion. He  suddenly  appears  at  Bethel,  one  of  the  seats 
of  the  state  worship  of  the  northern  kingdom ;  and 
having  delivered  a  denunciation  against  the  sins  of  the 
kingdom,  he  is  taken  to  task  by  the  priest  of  Bethel, 
and  in  all  probability  left  the  country,  retired  to  his 
own  land,  and  wrote  down  his  prophecies.  Hosea  seems, 
from  every  available  indication  bearing  on  the  subject,  to 
have  been  a  native  of  the  northern  kingdom,  and  he  con- 
cerns himself  with  its  affairs  almost  exclusively.  The 
other  literary  works  ascribed  to  this  age  probably  belong 
likewise  to  both  kingdoms.  And  by  the  way,  when  we  have 
so  many  anonymous  writers  in  the  Old  Testament,  and 
when  these  are  described  to  us  in  modern  works  by  such 
symbols  as  J,  E,  Q,  A,  B,  C,  E,  and  so  forth,  which  convey  i 
to  us  little  idea  of  their  personality,  it  is  positively  refresh-/ 
ing  to  get  face  to  face  with  two  writers  in  flesh  and  blood,; 
who  evidently  can  contain  more  than  one  idea  each.  Hav- 
ing got  two  such  men,  I  shall  keep  as  much  as  I  can  to 
their  testimony  (though  I  think  it  is  most  likely  that 
other  writers,  whose  names  we  know  not,  were  as  human, 
and  capable  of  taking  as  broad  and  comprehensive  a  view 
of  their  times).     Their  styles  and  themes  are  so  character- 


Amos  and  Hosea.  57 

istic,  that  I  have  unconsciously  formed  a  picture  of  the 
two  men  in  my  own  mind.  Amos  is  a  lithe,  keen,  snell 
man,  with  flashing  restless  eyes  and  dark  locks,  quick  in 
his  movements,  master  of  his  emotions,  though  his  nostrils 
throb  and  his  temples  swell  when  he  gets  excited.  He 
has  the  sharp  high-set  voice  and  wiry  body  of  the  modern 
Bedawy,  and  when  you  look  at  him,  you  expect  him  to 
say  something  lively  and  pointed — and  he  does  it.  He 
brings  the  air  of  the  country  about  him.  In  the  wilds 
of  Tekoa  he  has  seen  encounters  with  the  wild  beasts, 
and  has  gazed  at  the  stars  in  the  unclouded  blue  of  the 
midnight  sky.  So  he  is  bold  and  cool  and  collected  at  the 
luxurious  court,  and  comes  like  a  gust  of  sharp  bracing 
wind  through  its  stifling,  sensuous  atmosphere.  Hosea  is 
a  bigger  man,  slower  and  more  dignified  in  his  move- 
ments. He  is  an  inhabitant  of  a  town,  and  lived  surely 
near  a  public  bakery,  for  he  delights  to  draw  illustrations 
from  the  fiery  oven.  His  voice  is  softer  and  deeper ; 
when  you  look  on  him,  a  seriousness  comes  over  you, 
for  sorrow  is  marked  on  his  face.  If  the  modern  in- 
terpretation of  the  opening  chapters  is  right,  he  has 
been  sorely  tried  with  a  bad  wife,  whom  he  tenderly 
loved;  and  through  the  laceration  of  the  chords  of  his 
own  heart,  he  has  come  to  understand  the  unfailing  love 


^f  God. 

Clearly,  then,  we  are  in  a  time  when  literary  composi- 
tion was  well  developed  all  over  the  country.  "We  have 
not  only  the  graphic  pictures  of  patriarchal  life,  so  artless 
in  their  simplicity,  and  yet  so  artistic,  that  they  are  the  de- 
light of  persons  of  all  ages  in  all  countries.  We  have  the 
stories  of  the  rough,  rugged  deeds  of  the  Judges,  marked 
with  fine  delineations  of  character  and  touches  of  pathos 
and  humour ;  we  have  the  story  of  Elijah  in  a  form  that 


58       Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

nothing  could  improve ;  the  life  of  Samuel,  the  character 
of  Saul,  Jonathan,  and  David,  depicted  in  a  manner  that 
a  modern  novelist  could  not  surpass.  Of  an  entirely 
different  literary  cast  is  the  Book  of  the  Covenant,  with 
its  brief,  sententious  expression  of  codified  law.  And  in 
still  another  style  we  have  these  two  books  from  the 
hands  of  Amos  and  Hosea,  each  preserving  its  own  literary 
features,  and  indicating  a  very  different  personality  in  the 
writer,  but  both  well  finished  as  literary  productions, — 
the  herdman  of  Tekoa  delivering  his  rebukes  like  blows 
of  a  flail,  and  swelling  out  like  peals  of  thunder  in  his 
rounded  cycle  of  denunciation  of  the  nations;  the 
prophet  of  Israel,  tender  in  heart  as  a  woman,  less  care- 
ful of  the  form  of  his  sentences,  which  are  broken  by 
the  sobs  of  a  breaking  heart,  but  using  his  language  to 
express  some  of  the  finest  shades  of  thought  and  feeling. 
Though  the  productions  are  not  many,  they  are  thus 
sufficiently  varied,  and  give  plain  proof  that  the  power 
of  composition  on  varied  themes  was  an  achieved  fact  in 
this  age.  First  of  all,  the  language  by  this  time  has 
received  a  well-developed,  finished  form ;  and  secondly,  it 
is  not  only  spoken,  but  has  become  a  literary  medium  for 
any  class  of  composition. 

Now  language  is  a  coin  current  of  thought.  It  has  a 
certain  value  and  significance,  not  only  to  the  speaker 
or  writer,  but  to  the  hearer  or  reader.^  By  the  aid  of 
language,  when  once  it  has  reached  its  growth,  one  may 
convey  new  thoughts  to  others ;  but  in  doing  so  he  must 
make  himself  intelligible  to  them,  and  start  on  a  basis 
which  is  common  to  him  and  them.  Language  spoken 
or  written  implies  a  certain  stage  of  intelligence  in  the 
people  generally ;  and  written  language  implies  that  there 

^  See  Robertson  Smith,  O.T.  in  the  Jewish  Church,  Lect.  i.  p.  22. 


The  Mental  Condition  of  the  Age.  59 

are  people,  more  or  less  numerous,  who  can  read.  A 
popular  literature — i.e.,  literary  products  suited  and  inter- 
esting to  the  common  people — implies  readers  among  the 
common  people.  If  these  are  fair  inferences  from  the 
mere  existence  of  a  finished  language  and  an  achieved 
literature,  their  application  to  the  matter  in  hand  will 
enlarge  our  ideas  of  the  period  of  history  at  which  we 
take  our  start,  and  may  enable  us  to  go  back  to  a  period 
antecedent  to  it.  From  the  language  of  such  men  as 
Amos  and  Hosea  we  may  reach  the  mental  condition  of 
the  generation  in  which  they  lived.  And  seeing  that  the 
literature  before  us  is  national  and  popular,  if  anything 
at  all,  we  shall  be  able  in  some  measure  to  gauge  the 
standing  of  the  nation  as  a  whole, — to  feel,  so  to  speak, 
its  intellectual  pulse.  These  stories  of  the  patriarchs, 
judges,  and  prophets  were  not  written  by  some  obscure 
individual  and  hidden  away  in  his  chambers;  they  are 
the  very  stuff  that  the  people  would  delight  in,  and  the 
very  writing  of  them  implies  that  there  were  readers 
ready  for  them.  Nay,  the  prophetic  writings  themselves, 
granted  that  they  were  not  read  first  of  all  to  the  people, 
but  written  after  they  were  delivered,  from  the  very  fact 
that  they  are  accounts  of  speeches  thrown  into  the  form 
of  addresses,  show  that  they  are  meant  to  be  read  by  tlie 
people  of  the  times.  We  conclude,  therefore,  that  there 
was  a  circle,  narrower  or  wider — probably  pretty  wide — 
fit  to  understand  these  writings,  and  attaching  to  the 
words  and  phrases  the  meaning  which,  by  simple  con- 
struction, they  convey.  In  a  word,  we  get  beyond  mere 
"writings"  to  a  people  capable  of  reading  and  under- 
standing them. 

Now,  since  modern   historiographers   insist   upon  our 
starting    at    this    period,  we    might  reasonably  expect 


60       Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

tbem  to  give  us  some  account  of  this  remarkable  fact, 
that  we  have  suddenly  such  an  amount  of  varied  litera- 
ture, with  practically  nothing  of  the  kind — as  it  is  main- 
tained— in  the  age  preceding  it.  There  are  certain  songs 
which  in  their  origin  are  admitted  to  be  earlier,  but  they 
may,  it  is  said,  have  been  preserved  orally ;  and  in  general 
the  modern  writers  go  upon  the  assumption  that  this 
eighth  century  is  the  earliest  period  at  which  we  have 
written  documents.  Be  it  so ;  it  was  surely  worth  their 
while  to  give  us  some  idea  of  how  the  event  came  about ; 
why  at  this  age  there  should  be  so  much  of  sudden 
growth,  or  what  in  the  immediate  past  had  prepared  for 
it.  AVith  their  fondness  for  tracing  development,  here 
was  something  very  attractive  and  deeply  interesting ; 
and  one  might  have  thought  that  critical  writers,  who, 
according  to  Eobertson  Smith,^  are  such  masters  in  lit- 
erary anatomy  that  their  readers  "  can  follow  from  chap- 
ter to  chapter  the  process  by  which  the  Pentateuch  grew 
to  its  present  form,"  would  have  turned  their  attention  to 
the  history  of  the  rise  of  literary  composition  in  Israel. 
Yet  on  the  subject  they  have  very  little  to  say.  After 
asserting  ^  that  "  with  reference  to  any  period  earlier  than 
the  century  850-750  B.C.,  we  can  hardly  be  said  to  possess 
any  statistics,"  and  that  "a  contemporary  literature  is 
indispensable  for  the  description  of  standing  conditions," 
Wellhausen  goes  on : — 

"  But  it  was  within  this  period  that  Hebrew  hterature  first  flour- 
ished— after  the  Syrians  had  been  finally  repulsed,  it  would  seem. 
Writing  of  course  had  been  practised  from  a  muck  earlier  period, 
but  only  in  formal  instruments,  mainly  upon  stone.  At  an  early 
period  also  tlie  historical  sense  of  the  people  developed  itself  in  con- 
nection with  their  religion  ;  but  it  found  its  expression  in  songs, 


^  Pref.  to  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  ix.  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  464. 


A  Non-literary  and  a  Literary  Age.  61 

which  in  tlie  first  instance  were  handed  down  by  word  of  montli 
only.  Literature  began  with  the  collection  and  writing  out  of  those 
songs  ;  the  '  Book  of  the  Wars  of  the  Lord '  and  the  *  Book  of  Jashar' 
liXite.the  oldest  historical  books.  The  transition  was  next  made  to 
the  writing  of  prose  history  with  the  aid  of  legal  documents  and 
family  reminiscences  ;  a  large  portion  of  this  early  historiography 
has  been  preserved  to  us  in  the  books  of  Judges,  Samuel,  and  Kings. 
Contemporaneously  also  certain  collections  of  laws  and  decisions  of 
the  priests,  of  which  we  have  an  example  in  Exod.  xxi.,  xxii.,  were 
committed  to  writing.  Somewhat  later,  perhaps,  the  legends  about 
the  patriarchs  and  primitive  times,  the  origin  of  which  cannot  be 
assigned  to  a  very  early  date,i  received  literary  shape.  Specially 
remarkable  is  the  rise  of  a  written  prophecy.  The  question  why  it 
was  that  Elijali  and  Elisha  committed  nothing  to  writing,  while 
Amos  a  hundred  years  later  is  an  author,  hardly  admits  of  any 
other  answer  than  that  in  the  interval  a  non-literary  had  developed 
into  a  literary  age.  How  rapid  the  process  was  may  be  gathered 
from  a  comparison  between  the  singularly  broken  utterances  of  the 
earlier  oracle  contained  in  Isa.  xv.,  xvi.,  with  the  orations  of  Isaiah 
himself." 

On  the  showing  of  Wellhausen  himself,  then,  the  liter- 
ature is  sufficiently  varied  and  sufficiently  extensive  to 
demand  attention  merely  as  a  collection  of  literary  pro- 
ducts. And  whatever  may  be  the  advance  from  the 
"  earlier  oracle  "  to  the  "  orations  of  Isaiah,"  the  style  of 
Amos  and  Hosea  is  already  as  good  as  the  Hebrew  ever 
attained.  Isaiah  stands  alone  in  this  respect — and  every 
country  has  its  outstanding  writers — but  the  sentences  of 
the  herdman  of  Tekoa,  and  the  rhythm  of  his  language, 
and  even  the  sustained  rhetorical  efforts  of  chapters  in  suc- 
cession, are  as  finished  as  those  of  the  best  Hebrew  writers. 
"  To  the  unprejudiced  judgment,"  says  Kobertson  Smith,^ 
"  the  prophecy  of  Amos  appears  one  of  the  best  examples 
of  pure  Hebrew  style.     The  language,  the  images,   the 

^  A  footnote  here  is  referred  to  below  in  chapter  v,  p.  122. 
^  Prophets  of  Israel,  p.  125  f. 


62        Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

grouping  are  alike  admirable;  and  the  simplicity  of  the 
diction  ...  is  a  token  not  of  rusticity,  but  of  perfect 
mastery  over  a  language  which,  though  unfit  for  the  ex- 
pression of  abstract  ideas,  is  unsurpassed  as  a  vehicle  for 
impassioned  speech."  As  to  the  '  Book  of  the  Wars  of  the 
Lord'  and  the  'Book  of  Jasliar,'  which  Wellhausen  sets  down 
as  the  oldest  historical  books,  we  have  so  little  from  them 
that  it  would  not  be  safe  to  draw  deductions  from  their 
style.  But  if  we  examine  songs  such  as  that  of  Deborah, 
whicli  Stade  admits  to  bear  the  marks  of  the  historical 
events  which  it  celebrates — even  if  it  were  handed  down 
orally  to  this  so-called  literary  age — we  find  it  distin- 
guished by  no  inconsiderable  literary  powers.  And  then 
the  "early  historiography"  preserved  in  the  books  of 
Judges,  Samuel,  and  Kings,  has  nothing  to  lead  us  to 
suppose  that  it  was  the  first  effort  at  such  composition ; 
while  the  stories  of  the  patriarchs  are  in  the  best  style  of 
the  characteristic  Hebrew  prose.  The  Laws,  again,  of  the 
Book  of  the  Covenant,  are  expressed  in  as  clear  and  fin- 
ished language  as  those  of  the  Codes  which  are  placed 
much  farther  down  in  history.  It  remains  then,  on  the 
hypothesis  before  us^  that  literature  sprang  into  existence 
fully  developed,  lor  the  products  before  us  give  no  signs 
of  being  earliest  efforts,  and,  what  is  most  vital,  they  are 
not  of  one  class  of  composition,  as  might  have  been  ex- 
pected at  the  commencement  of  a  literary  age,  but  are 
most  varied.^  From  all  that  appears  on  the  face  of  them, 
we  might  most  naturally  infer  that  literary  composition, 
in  every  variety  of  form,  had  been  long  prevalent  among 
the  Hebrews  by  the  time  these  works  were  written.     And 

^  The  "elegy  "  as  a  particular  kind  of  composition  was  known  to  Amos  ; 
for  the  word  rendered  "lamentation"  in  chap.  v.  1  has  this  technical 
sense. 


Oratory  and  Literary  Activity.  63 

surely  it  is  a  very  poor  account  to  get  from  those  who  pro- 
fess to  be  able  to  follow  the  history  step  by  step,  that  in 
a  century  "a  non-literary  had  developed  into  a  literary 
age. 

Robertson  Smith  has  some  excellent  remarks,^  tending 
to  show,  from  the  case  of  the  Arabs  of  the  desert,  that  it 
was  nothincr  extraordinarv  for  men  of  humble  station  like 
Amos,  with  little  or  no  book-learning,  to  be  masters  of 
the  highest  oratory: — 

"  Among  the  Hebrews  as  in  the  Arabian  desert,  knowledge  and 
oratory  are  not  affairs  of  professional  education,  or  dependent  for 
their  cultivation  on  wealth  and  social  status.  ...  In  Hebrew  as 
in  Arabic,  the  best  writing  is  an  unaffected  transcript  of  the  best 
speaking  ;  the  literary  merit  of  the  book  of  Genesis  or  the  history 
of  Elijah,  like  that  of  the  '  Kitab  el  Aghany  '  or  of  the  Norse  Sagas, 
is  that  they  read  as  if  they  were  told  by  word  of  mouth  ;  and  in 
like  manner,  the  prophecies  of  Amos,  though  evidently  rearranged 
for  publication,  and  probably  shortened  from  their  original  spoken 
form,  are  excellent  writing,  because  the  prophet  writes  as  he  spoke, 
preserving  all  the  effects  of  pointed  and  dramatic  delivery,  with 
that  breath  of  lyrical  fervour  which  lends  a  special  charm  to  the 
highest  Hebrew  poetry." 

All  this  is  very  good,  but  it  does  not  bring  us  a  step 
nearer  to  the  solution  of  the  question,  How  did  the  literary 
custom  arise  ?  and  it  takes  no  note  of  the  fact  that  by  a 
"  literary  age  "  must  be  in  any  case  meant  an  age  of  readers 
as  well  as  writers.  The  only  thing  Wellhausen  notes 
in  connection  with  the  transition  of  a  non-literary  to  a 
literary  age,  is  the  final  repulse  of  the  Syrians,  whatever 
that  may  have  had  to  do  with  it.  What  we  want  to  know 
is,  What  gave  the  impulse  to  this  literary  activity,  and 
what  prepared  the  people — or  a  circle  of  them — for  being 
able  to  follow  it  ?     Judged  by  mere  literary  standards, 

^Prophets,  p.  126f. 


6  4        Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

these  compositions  would  lead  us  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  literary  art  had  been  long  practised ;  or,  to  put  it 
otherwise,  there  is  nothing  on  the  face  of  these  materials 
as  literary  products  to  hinder  us  from  accepting  writings 
as  belonging  to  an  earlier  period,  if  they  can  be  otherwise 
authenticated ;  there  is  nothing,  based  on  a  consideration 
of  the  culture  of  the  age,  to  force  us  to  the  position  that 
this  is  the  beginning  of  a  literary  age. 

I  take  it,  then,  that  no  sufficient  account  has  been  given 
of  the  remarkable  phenomenon  before  us.  Even  if  Well- 
hausen's  admission  is  taken  into  account,  that  writing 
was  practised  from  an  early  age,  but  only  in  formal  in- 
struments, and  mostly  on  stone,  there  is  an  immense  step 
from  that  to  this  sudden  production  in  one  century  of  so 
varied  a  literature ;  and  the  other  fact  is  to  be  explained 
that  there  must  have  been  reading  circles  of  larger  or 
smaller  size.  Even  rude  writing  on  stone  is  an  art  that 
implied  teaching  of  it,  and  the  thing  written  was  meant 
to  be  read.^  Writing  implies  reading ;  both  imply  an 
education,  and  a  sustained  education  of  some  kind.  A 
literary  age  is,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  to  a  certain 
extent  an  educated  age ;  and  as  a  literature,  even  of  the 
extent  allowed  by  the  modern  historians,  exhibiting  such 
variety  as  these  compositions  present,  demands  some  ante- 
cedent preparation,  much  more  must  we  postulate  for  the 
age  for  which  the  compositions  were  written,  a  period 
of  antecedent  education.  In  a  word,  we  are  clearly  not  at 
the  beginning  of  literary  or  educational  activity  in  Israel. 

^  Andrew  Lang,  -while  contending  that  Homer  wrote  his  poems,  adds, 
"But  he  did  not  write  to  be  read"  ('Good  Words,'  Aug.  1891).  Still, 
Homer  was  not  the  only  one  in  his  day  that  could  write ;  and,  as  Prof. 
Jebb  remarks,  long  before  the  date  of  the  earliest  extant  writing  on 
marbles,  the  Greeks  may  have  attained  to  ease  in  writing  on  softei 
materials.     (In trod,  to  Homer,  p.  110.) 


The  Writings  as  Eeligious  Products.  65 

II.  We  now  go  a  step  farther,  and  by  similar  reasoning 
we  can  show  that  as  religions  products  the  compositions 
before  us  imply  a  considerable  degree  of  religious  intelli- 
gence and  education.  A  man  does  not  speak  or  write 
unless  he  knows  that  his  hearer  or  reader  can  follow 
him.  And  religious  talk  or  composition  presupposes  re- 
ligious intelligence  corresponding  to  it.  Granted  that  a 
new  writer  makes  an  advance  in  thought  and  puts  for- 
ward new  ideas,  if  he  is  to  be  understood  at  all  he  must 
start  from  the  level  of  his  reader's  intelligence ;  and  it 
is  useless  for  him  to  publish  unless  he  counts  upon  a 
circle  of  readers  who  can  understand  him. 

Accustomed  as  we  are  to  the  spiritual  language  of  Holy 
Scripture,  we  can  only  with  difficulty  comprehend  the 
time  and  training  implied  in  the  development  of  a 
religious  vocabulary.  Language  at  best  lags  far  behind 
thought ;  and  when  we  consider  that  thought  itself,  has  to 
be  drawn  out,  purified,  refined  by  reflection,  exalted  by  the 
elimination  of  lower  material  conceptions,  we  shall  per- 
ceive that  the  attainment  of  a  vocabulary  expressing  ideas 
such  as  the  herdman  of  Tekoa  and  Hosea  of  Israel  dwell 
among,  implies  both  in  the  speaker  and  in  the  hearer  a 
preparation  of  no  little  time  and  no  little  labour.  An 
illustration  from  the  history  of  modern  missions  will  help 
to  make  this  clearer.  When  Protestant  missionaries  first 
went  to  Syria,  about  the  year  1826,  after  surveying  the 
field  before  them,  they  wisely  resolved  to  make  use  of 
the  printing-press  as  soon  as  they  should  find  opportunity. 
Though  many  of  the  people  could  not  read,  they  were  not 
altogether  unlettered ;  the  people  with  whom  it  was  hoped 
easiest  contact  would  be  made  were  members  of  the  Greek 
Orthodox  Church,  devout  enough  in  their  way,  and  under 
the  regular  care  of  their  own  religious  teachers;  and  it 

£ 


^6^        Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

was  hoped  that  by  the  establishment  of  schools  the  power 
and  the  desire  to  read  would  be  extended.  And  so,  in 
addition  to  the  Scriptures,  it  was  designed  to  prepare 
certain  works  of  a  religious  and  educational  character,  to 
be  ready  for  the  demand  when  it  should  arise.  Two  of 
the  earliest  works  prepared  and  printed  were  transla- 
tions of  *  Robinson  Crusoe '  and  the  *  Pilgrim's  Pro- 
gress'— tlie  former  designed  to  be  an  interesting  read- 
ing-book, the  latter  to  be  useful  as  a  religious  educator. 
The  fates  of  the  two  works  were  remarkable.  While 
*  Eobinson  Crusoe '  had  an  immense  popularity,  the 
'  Pilgrim's  Progress '  lay  in  stock  for  many  years.  The 
former  was  accepted  and  read  as  a  religious  book,  not 
more  because  it  was  printed  and  circulated  by  mission- 
aries, than  because  of  the  quasi-^iow.^  reflections  —  ad- 
mirably done  by  the  translator  into  popular  language 
— in  which  the  unfortunate  Eobinson  so  freely  indulges ; 
but  of  the  *  Pilgrim's  Progress  '  the  common  people  could 
make  nothing.  The  reason  is  obvious :  they  had  not  the 
religious  experience  sufficient  to  enable  them  to  under- 
stand a  book  which  even  our  children  delight  in ;  and  it 
was  almost  half  a  century  before  a  race  grew  up,  educated 
in  missionary  schools  and  taught  in  the  Scripture,  that 
could  appreciate  the  book ;  and  now  it  is  as  great  a 
favourite  with  old  and  young  as  with  ourselves.  This 
was  a  case,  be  it  observed,  where  the  people  had  for  cen- 
turies possessed  a  definite  religion  and  a  printed  litera- 
ture. What  must  the  case  have  been  where,  by  the 
hypothesis,  the  people  had  the  merest  rudiments  of  re- 
ligious conception,  and  no  literature  ? 

Let  us  look  at  the  facts  of  the  case  before  us.  We 
have  Amos,  not  writing  a  book  to  be  read  by  later  times, 
but  speaking  his  word  in  the  northern  kingdom,  and  com- 


Religious  Tone  of  Amos  and  Ilosca,    ^^^^y.    67 

mitting  it  to  writing  in  tlie  southern ;  and  we  have  Hosea 
probably  both  speaking  and  writing.  It  may  be  that,  as 
Robertson  Smith  has  told  us,  the  language  used  by  Amos 
is  not  fitted  for  conveying  abstract  ideas.  At  all  events, 
it  is  an  impassioned,  fervent  language,  whose  elements  are 
words  purified  from  all  low  taint  of  superstition  or  anim- 
ism, and,  as  we  shall  see,  embodying  thoughts  of  world- 
wide applicability.  "  Though  the  earliest  of  the  canonical 
prophets,  his  view  of  the  world  is  perhaps  broader  than 
that  of  any  of  them,  just  as  his  definitions  of  religion 
surpass  in  incisiveness  and  clearness  those  of  .the  major- 
ity of  his  successors."  ^  Hosea's  style,  though  less  finished 
from  a  literary  point  of  view,  is  deeper  in  pathos  and 
richer  in  spirituality.  It  is  his  preoccupation  with  the 
thought  that  apparently  mars  the  symmetry  of  his  dic- 
tion. Both  prophets  give  evidence  of  deep  reflection 
on  religious  questions,  resulting  in  views  of  life  and 
duty,  and  conceptions  of  what  God  is,  which  may  be 
placed  in  the  first  rank  among  the  achievements  of  Old 
Testament  writers,  and  afford  evidence  that  thinking 
of  this  kind,  and  views  of  this  character,  were  compre- 
hensible by  the  people  to  whom  they  spoke.  In  other 
w^ords,  they  imply  an  antecedent  religious  education. 
Indeed,  the  very  oldest  written  works  to  which  Hebrew 
writers  refer,  show  by  their  titles  that  the  earliest  litera- 
ture was  based  on  religion.  '  The  Book  of  the  Wars  ot 
Jehovah '  implies  in  its  name  that  even  the  rough 
struggles  of  Israel  were  regarded  as  God-guided ;  and 
*  The  Book  of  Jashar,'  or  the  Upright,  testifies  to  the  faith 
in  Jehovah's  righteousness  in  Israel  (Judges  v.  11).^ 

We  shall  find  the  advocates  of  the  modern  theory  tell- 

1  A.  B.  Davidson  in  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  16G. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  46. 


68       Wiitings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

ing  us  that  Amos  was  the  first  to  teach  this,  and  Hosea 
the  first  to  say  the  other  thing.  Whatever  they  said, 
and  whatever  they  were  the  first  to  say,  the  people  of 
their  day  knew  the  meaning  of  the  words  and  expres- 
sions addressed  to  them.  If  these  prophets  were  the 
first  to  speak  in  this  manner,  then,  of  course,  their 
hearers  were  the  first  to  hear  these  things ;  and  yet  the 
people  seem  to  understand  quite  well  all  that  is  said  to 
them.  There  is  a  religious  phraseology  in  existence,  a 
religious  consciousness  equal  to  comprehend  it.  These 
books  are  religious  from  beginning  to  end.  The  persons 
who  heard  or  read  them  must  have  had  such  an  ante- 
cedent training  or  knowledge  as  would  enable  them  to 
follow  them,  and  we  cannot  by  any  possibility  admit 
that  the  whole  religious  consciousness  of  the  nation  took 
a  sudden  start  to  such  a  level.  Let  any  one  try  for  a 
moment  to  imagine  Amos  addressing  the  people  of  Israel 
in  tlie  name  of  Jaliaveh :  "  Seek  ye  me,  and  ye  shall 
live "  (Amos  v.  4,  6) :  "  Seek  good,  and  not  evil,  that  ye 
may  live ;  and  Jahaveh,  the  God  of  hosts,  shall  be  with 
you,  in  such  a  manner  as  ye  say.  Hate  the  evil,  and 
love  the  good,  and  establish  judgment  in  the  gate"  (v. 
14, 15) :  "  Let  judgment  run  down  as  waters,  and  righteous- 
ness as  a  mighty  stream  "  (v.  24) :  "  I  will  send  a  famine 
in  the  land,  not  a  famine  of  bread,  nor  a  thirst  for  water, 
but  of  hearing  the  words  of  Jahaveh"  (viii.  11) ; — and  ask 
whether  the  people  who  heard  the  words  had  not  already 
been  accustomed  to  form  some  ideas  of  judgment  and 
righteousness,  and  evil  and  good,  some  conceptions  of 
the  holiness  of  their  national  God  far  above  the  level 
of  persons  at  the  animistic  or  even  the  narrow  national 
stage  of  religion.  Of  the  teaching  of  Amos  as  to  the 
nature   and   character   of   the  God   in    whose   name   he 


Religious  Phraseology.  69 

spoke,  we  shall  have  to  treat  at  length  in  the  sequel. 
I  wish  at  present  to  emphasise  this  one  point,  that  even 
this  cycle  of  moral  conceptions  implies  an  antecedent  edu- 
cation of  a  special  kind  and  of  long  continuance.  When 
we  turn  to  Hosea,  we  find  even  a  richer  vocabulary  and 
still  deeper  conceptions.  "Sow  to  yourselves/'  he  says, 
"in  righteousness,  and  reap  according  to  mercy;  break 
up  your  fallow  ground :  for  it  is  time  to  seek  Jahaveh, 
till  He  come  and  rain  righteousness  upon  you.  Ye  have 
plowed  wickedness,  ye  have  reaped  iniquity;  ye  have 
eaten  the  fruit  of  lies"  (Hos.  x.  12,  13):  "Therefore 
turn  thou  to  thy  God:  keep  mercy  and  judgment,  and 
wait  on  thy  God  continually"  (xii.  6).  We  shall  after- 
wards see  what  Hosea's  ideas  of  God  were ;  meantime,  I 
call  attention  to  such  expressions  as  these, — to  his  con- 
stant dwelling  on  "mercy,"  "truth,"  "judgment,"  "fear  of 
Jahaveh,"  ^  and  such  declarations  as  these :  "  In  Thee 
the  fatherless  findeth  mercy "  (xiv.  3) ;  "  The  ways  of 
Jahaveh  are  right,  and  the  just  shall  walk  in  them :  but 
transgressors  shall  fall  therein"  (xiv.  9);  "I  drew  them 
with  cords  of  a  man,  with  bands  of  love"  (xi.  4), — all 
which  imply  something  very  different  from  the  first  be- 
ginnings of  reflection  on  religious  things.  This  point 
requires  to  be  insisted  upon,  because,  in  discussions  on 
the  development  of  religious  thought,  the  "original"  or 
"primary"  significations  of  expressions  are  often  relied 
upon  as  evidence.  What  is  clearly  established  by  the 
most  cursory  glance  at  the  books  of  Amos  and  Hosea, 
or  indeed  any  of  the  books  belonging  to  what  is  called 
the  first  writing  age,  is,  that  we  are  already  far  beyond 
a  tentative  or  infantile  use  of  language  to  express  religious 
conceptions. 

1  See,  for  example,  i.  6  ;  ii.  19,  20,  23  ;  iii.  5  ;  iv.  1 ;  vi.  6. 


70       Writings  of  the  NintJi  and  Mghth  Centuries  B.C. 

Thus,  then,  from  these  two  sides,  the  merely  literary 
and  the  religious  aspects  of  the  books  before  us,  we  con- 
clude that  the  eighth  century  rests  upon  an  anterior 
stage  of  preparation,  which  must  have  been  consider- 
able in  both  respects.  Tliere  was  need  to  dwell  on  this 
aspect  of  the  subject,  lest,  by  taking  as  our  starting- 
point  this  comparatively  late  period,  it  might  have  been 
assumed  that  we  were  starting  from  a  low  stage  of  cul- 
ture in  order  to  trace  growth  upwards.^  The  whole  point 
of  the  present  argument  is,  that  we  are  already  at  a 
high  stage  both  of  literary  culture  and  of  religious  con- 
sciousness. 

Our  argument  hitherto  has  been  of  an  inferential  and 
indirect  kind,  to  the  effect  that  the  condition  we  have 
found  prevailing  at  the  time  of  the  first  admitted  literary 
compositions  implies  an  antecedent  period  of  literary  ac- 
tivity and  religious  education.  There  is  implied  in  this 
inference  that  the  teaching  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets 
in  substance  also  rests  upon  antecedent  teaching ;  and  as 
this  position  is  strenuously  controverted  by  those  who 
make  these  prophets  innovators,  not  reformers  or  con- 
tinuators,  it  is  important  to  look  at  evidence,  of  a 
I  direct  or  positive  kind,  on  the  question.  There  is 
nothing  in  the  writings  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets 
to  indicate  that  they  came  forward  as  exponents  of 
a  new  religious  idea,  or  that  they  regarded  themselves 

^  In  view  of  these  utterances  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets,  and  what 
they  imply,  it  is  simply  incomprehensible  to  me  how  any  one  can  write 
of  the  Decalogue  as  a  recent  writer  in  this  country  does  :  "  The  Decalogue, 
as  we  have  it,  does  not  reflect  the  standard  of  conduct  which  prevailed  in 
his  [Moses']  day,  or  for  a  long  time  after  him  ;  it  reflects,  indeed,  a  stan- 
dard of  conduct  which  only  became  fully  present  to  the  Jewish  mind 
many  centuries  later,  under  the  influence  of  the  prophets." — National 
Religion,  by  Allan  Menzies,  p.  22. 


A  ntecedent  Prophets.  71 

as  originators  in  any  proper  sense  of  the  word.  On  the 
contrary,  they  represent  to  the  people,  and  lead  us  to  be- 
lieve, that  they  are  proclaiming  the  true  and  authoritative 
religion  in  opposition  to  the  errors  and  abuses  of  their 
tunes.  Nay;  they  do  not  leave  the  matter  in  this  in- 
definite form:  they  refer  to  men  before  them,  prophets 
like  themselves,  who  had  done  exactly  the  same  thing. 
Let  us  listen  to  Amos :  "  I  raised  up  of  your  sons  [he  is 
addressing  Israel,  the  northern  kingdom]  for  prophets,  and 
of  your  young  men  for  Nazirites.  Is  it  not  even  thus, 
O  ye  children  of  Israel  ?  saith  Jahaveh.  But  ye  gave  the 
Nazirites  wine  to  drink ;  and  commanded  the  prophets, 
saying.  Prophesy  not"  (Amos  ii.  11,  12).  "Surely  Ja- 
liaveh  God  will  do  nothing,  but  He  revealeth  His  secret 
unto  His  servants  the  prophets.  .  .  .  Jahaveh  hath 
spoken,  who  can  but  prophesy  ?  "  (iii.  7,  8).  And  to  the 
same  purpose  Hosea:  "Therefore  have  I  hewed  them 
by  the  prophets ;  I  have  slain  them  by  the  words  of  my 
mouth:  and  thy  judgments^  are  as  the  light  which  goeth 
forth"  (Hos.  vi.  5):  "I  have  also  spoken  unto  the  pro- 
phets, and  I  have  multiplied  visions,  and  by  the  hand  of 
the  prophets  have  I  used  similitudes "  (xii.  10) :  "And 
by  a  prophet  Jahaveh  brought  Israel  up  out  of  Egypt, 
and  by  a  prophet  was  he  preserved"  (xii.  13). 

All  these  references  are  plain  and  pertinent  enough  on 
the  Biblical  account  of  the  preceding  history,  which  gives 
us  from  Samuel  onwards,^  a  succession  of  prophetic  men 
who  are  represented  as  standing  forth  reproving,  rebuking, 
and  asserting  the  true  religion  of  Jahaveh.  But  they  are 
meaningless  on  the  modern  theory,  which  represents 
Elijah  as  a  half- legendary  character,  and  his  successor 

1  Or  "  my  judgments,"  according  to  some  ancient  versions. 

2  "All  the  prophets  from  Samuel,"  says  St  Peter  in  Acts  iii.  24. 


72        Writings  of  the  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries  B.C. 

Elisha  as  one  who  compassed  political  ends  by  means  of 
very  questionable  morality ;  ^  and  as  for  Samuel,  when 
the  earlier  and  true  account  of  him  is  eliminated  from 
the  later  and  false,  lie  comes  out  of  the  critical  crucible 
an  old  man  endowed  with  second-sight,  who  for  a  silver 
sixpence  could  tell  people  what  had  become  of  strayed 
asses  and  suchlike  matters.^  Clearly  these  two  prophets 
are  confident  that  they  are  continuators  of  the  teaching 
of  men  like  themselves;  and  all  the  proof  that  Amos 
gives  of  the  fact  is  the  appeal  to  the  knowledge  of  his 
hearers.  "  Is  it  not  so,  0  house  of  Israel  ? "  We  have 
the  testimony,  in  a  word,  of  the  generation  in  which  they 
lived ;  and  when  modern  critics  come  forward  and  tell  us 
that  Amos  and  Hosea  were  the  first  to  teach  as  they  did 
— simply  because  they  will  not  allow  us  to  appeal  to  any 
documents  as  of  earlier  date — I  am  quite  prepared  to  put 
the  issue  in  this  form,  that  Amos  and  Hosea  knew  better 
where  they  had  got  their  religious  education  than  half- 
a-dozen  modern  professors  can  tell  us.  Either  there  was 
a  succession  of  prophetic  men  before  Amos  and  Hosea 
whose  teaching  was  of  the  same  spirit  with  theirs — in 
which  case  the  view  of  the  antecedent  history  given  by 
the  Biblical  historians  is  strongly  confirmed,  and  the 
"prophetic  period"  has  its  boundaries  much  farther 
back  than  the  modern  theory  allows ;  or  else  there  was 
no  such  succession — in  which  case  our  witnesses  are  set 
down  as  not  knowing  the  source  of  their  own  religious 
instruction  in  the  first  place,  and  in  the  second  place 
the  work  of  these  earliest  writing  prophets  is  left  as  a 
thing  hanging  in  the  air,  to  use  Wellhausen's  own  simile,^ 
like  a  man  trying  to  hold  himself  up  by  his  waist-band. 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  293. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  253.  3  i|,i(j.,  p.  39. 


The  Prophets  imply  a  Bachground.  73 

I  quote  once  more  the  cautious  and  well-weiglied  words 
of  Dr  Davidson : — 

"  Several  well-known  modern  writers  on  prophecy  .  .  .  have  con- 
cluded that  such  a  prophet  as  Amos  stood  virtually  alone  in  the 
nation ;  that  there  was  a  great  gulf  fixed,  on  one  side  of  which 
stood  the  prophet,  and  on  the  other  the  people  in  a  mass  ;  and  that 
what  the  prophet  did  was  nothing  less  than  to  enunciate  and  intro- 
duce a  new  religion,  which  had  almost  nothing  in  common  with 
that  hitherto  professed  by  the  people  beyond  the  name  Jehovah  em- 
ployed by  both.  This  theory  is  not  only  opposed  to  all  the  represen- 
tations of  the  prophets  themselves  and  the  universal  tradition  among 
the  writers  of  Israel,  but  it  entirely  fails  to  account  for  the  prophet^ 
The  old  view,  according  to  which  each  prophet  was  a  simple,  iso- 
lated miracle,  out  of  all  connection  with  the  life  and  thought  of  his 
time,  really  offered  an  explanation,  if  the  view  could  be  accepted  ; 
and  if  the  choice  lay  between  the  two  theories,  we  should  be  driven 
to  accept  the  old  theory  as  necessary  to  the  satisfaction  of  our  under- 
standing. The  fact,  however,  that  the  prophet  Amos  himself  arose 
out  of  the  lowest  ranks  of  the  people,  is  sufficient  evidence  that  there 
existed  no  such  gulf  between  the  prophets  and  the  universal  mass  of 
the  nation  as  the  modern  writers  referred  to  represent."  ^ 


^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  165  f. 


0?  TK\ 


74 


CHAPTER    IV. 


Since  the  admitted  writings  of  the  ninth  and  eighth  centuries  imply  an 
antecedent  literary  and  religious  activity,  and  since  the  earliest  writing 
prophets  appeal  to  others  before  them,  an  attempt  is  mude  to  find,  if 
possible,  traces  of  such  activity  and  such  men — Indications  of  writing 
in  early  times — The  tablets  of  TeU-el-Amarna — Inference  as  to  the 
possibility  of  written  composition  long  before  the  ninth  century — Oral 
transmission  does  not  exclude  writing — Power  to  write  implies  instruc- 
tion and  exercise — As  to  religious  education,  the  so-called  "schools  of 
the  prophets"  are  considered — Attempt  of  critical  writers  to  dissociate 
Samuel  and  Amos  from  these  societies  —  Wellhausen^s  admission  of 
early  religious  colouring  of  the  history — Argument  therefrom  —  The 
accuracy  of  the  oldest  writings  in  matters  of  topography,  and  what  it 
implies — Conclusion  that  the  earliest  history  writers  are  not  at  the  stage 
of  floating  traditionary  myth — Literary  activity  of  priestly  class. 

"We  have  thus'  seen  that  as  literary  products  and  as 
religious  products  the  writings  of  the  ninth  and  eighth 
centuries  imply  a  long  course  of  education,  reflection,  and 
culture.  We  have  also  heard  the  earliest  of  the  writing 
prophets  appealing  to  an  antecedent  series  of  public 
men,  who  are  said  to  have  anticipated  them  in  the  work 
of  instruction  and  admonition.  Of  all  this  antecedent 
activity  the  modern  historians  give  practically  no  account. 
Let  us  inquire  whether  from  the  Biblical  writers  we  can 


rrovision  for  Education.  75 

gain  any  information.  As  the  time  of  wliicli  we  are 
speaking  is  confessedly  an  age  of  readers  as  well  as 
writers,  it  is  interesting  to  inquire  whether  we  have  any 
proofs  of  the  existence  of  literary  activity  at  an  earlier 
period.  We  cannot,  of  course,  from  the  restriction  we 
have  imposed  on  ourselves,  build  upon  such  statements 
as  occur  in  the  Pentateuch  to  the  effect  that  Moses  wrote 
this  and  that.  But  we  may  ask  whether  we  have  any 
reliable  information  at  all  as  to  the  provisions  that 
existed  in  Israel  for  perpetuating  these  arts  of  reading 
and  writinoj. 

And  here  we  come  upon  a  most  remarkable  and  sig- 
nificant fact, — that  the  Old  Testament  books  from  begin- 
ning to  end  give  us  no  intimations  of  the  nature  of  suchl 
provisions.  They  imply  that  writing  and  reading  were 
generally  known,  but  they  tell  us  nothing  about  the 
communication  of  instruction  in  these  things.  We  find, 
indeed,  in  the  Pentateuch,^  the  injunction  in  general  terms 
to  teach  the  precepts  of  the  Law  to  the  children  (Exod. 
xii.  26,  27;  Deut.  iv.  9,  vi.  6-20),  and  the  people  are 
enjoined  in  cases  of  difficulty  to  inquire  at  the  priest  or 
judge.  Bat,  on  the  one  hand,  if  the  books  in  which 
these  injunctions  occur  are  of  late  date,  we  cannot  from 
them  infer  anything  to  our  purpose ;  on  the  other  hand, 
even  if  the  injunctions  rest  upon  a  sound  early  tradition, 
they  are  so  general  that  we  are  still  left  in  ignorance. 
The  matter  of  education  is  not  apparently  committed  to 

^  Delitzsch  has  pointed  out  that  there  is  no  mention  of  writing  in  the 
striking  account  of  Abraham's  dealing  with  the  Hittites  in  Gen.  xxiii.; 
nor  does  the  usual  word  for  writing  (Jcatah)  occur  in  any  part  of  that  book  ; 
whereas  from  Exodus  onwards  an  acquaintance  with  and  varied  use  of 
writing  are  implied.  It  would  thus  appear  as  if  the  Pentateuch  placed 
the  introduction  of  writing  after  the  patriarchal  age  and  before  the  time 
of  the  Exodus. — Introd.  to  Comm.  on  Genesis,  Eng.  transl.,  p.  3  fF. 


76  The  "Earlier  PropMsr 

any  but  the  parents,  and  the  question  would  only  be 
thrown  back  a  stage  as  to  their  fitness  to  teach;  and 
from  none  of  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament  can  we 
gather  what  appliances,  if  any,  existed  for  the  instruction 
of  youth.  Even  in  regard  to  the  priests,  who,  on  any 
theory  as  to  the  development  of  the  history,  must  have 
had  to  undergo  special  instruction  in  the  matters  of 
ceremonial  intrusted  to  them,  we  are  not  told  anything 
as  to  the  means  provided  for  imparting  it.  Were  the 
age  before  us  really  the  first  literary  age,  we  should  ex- 
pect some  of  the  writers  of  the  period  to  give  us  some 
hint  of  the  new  activity  and  the  impulse  that  led  to 
it.  But  we  have  no  such  indication.  In  short,  were 
we  to  reason  from  the  silence  of  the  books,  we  might 
conclude  that  there  was  no  provision  for  education  at 
all  in  even  the  narrower  circles  of  a  learned  class,  if 
such  existed.  But  we  could  not  possibly  find  a  better 
example  of  the  inadequacy  of  the  argument  from  silence ; 
for,  to  say  nothing  else,  it  would  leave  the  so-called 
first  literary  age  destitute  of  any  foundation,  a  sudden 
phenomenon  without  any  preparation;  and  if  anything 
in  the  world  implies  preparation  and  development  it  is 
literary  activity. 

But  for  the  consideration  just  mentioned,  we  might 
have  concluded  that  these  references  to  reading  and 
writing  are,  in  critical  phraseology,  a  projection  of  later 
ideas  into  earlier  times.  There  is,  however,  another  con- 
clusion which  may  be  drawn  from  this  silence  as  to 
educational  activity.  The  Old  Testament  writers,  when 
they  speak  of  reading  and  writing,  speak  of  them  as 
matters  of  course,  as  if  they  were  commonly  practised, 
well-understood  things.  It  is,  indeed,  the  custom  in 
some  quarters  to  doubt  the  possibility  of  literary  activity 


Early  Writing  in  Egypt  and  the  East.  77 

on  the  part  of  Moses ;  ^  and,  as  we  have  seen,  Wellhausen 
only  grudgingly  admits  that  writing  was  practised  before 
the  eighth  century.  It  may  turn  out,  however,  that  the 
silence  of  the  Old  Testament  writers  may  have  the  very 
explanation  I  have  just  suggested — viz.,  that  from  a  very 
early  time  reading  and  writing  were  quite  common.  For, 
to  speak  first  of  all  of  Egypt,  not  only  are  there  proofs 
of  the  practice  of  writing  long  before  the  time  of  Moses, 
but  the  period  immediately  preceding  the  exodus  was 
one  of  remarkable  activity  and  high  attainment.  The 
poem  of  Pentaur,2  which  has  been  compared  with  a  lay 
of  the  Iliad,  celebrates  a  victory  gained  over  the  Hittites 
by  Eameses  II.,  the  father  of  the  Pharaoh  of  the  exodus. 
And  beyond  Egypt,  it  now  appears,  literary  activity  pre- 
vailed to  an  extraordinary  degree;  "and  the  bricks  are 
alive  at  this  day  to  testify  it."  Quite  recently,  indeed, 
a  new  light  has  been  thrown  on  this  whole  subject  by 
the  discovery  at  Tell-el-Amarna,  in  Upper  Egypt,  of 
certain  tablets,  written  in  the  cuneiform  character,  and 
going  back  to  the  century  before  the  date  assigned  by  most 
Egyptologists  to  the  exodus.  These  prove,  according  to 
Sayce,^  that  "  good  schools  existed  (at  that  time)  through- 
out Western  Asia ;  that  the  people  of  Canaan  could  read 
and  write  before  the  Israelitish  conquest ;  that  there  was 

1  Thus  Allan  Menzies :  "Even  if  he  were  to  some  extent  a  man  of 
letters  (and  it  is  doubtful  if  he  could  be  so),  any  written  words  of  his 
which  survive  must  be  extremely  short." — National  Religion,  p,  15  f. 

2  See  Note  IX. 

3  'Contemp.  Review'  for  August  1888.  In  the  'Presbyterian  Review* 
for  the  same  month  there  is  another  early  notice  of  the  tablets.  Fuller 
accounts  have  been  subsequently  published.  See,  e.g.,  the  '  Proceedings  of 
the  Society  of  Biblical  Archaeology '  from  1888,  and  the  new  series  of 
'Records  of  the  Past.'  The  papers  of  M.  Halevy  in  the  'Revue  des 
Etudes  Juives'  for  1890  are  particularly  valuable.  See  also  Conder  in  the 
'Scottish  Review  '  for  April  1891. 


78  The  ''Earlier  Prophets." 

an  active  literary  intercourse  from  one  end  of  tlie  civil- 
ised East  to  the  other."  It  is  true,  the  medium  of  commu- 
nication was  the  Babylonian  language  and  script ;  but 
we  cannot  suppose  that  a  people  acquainted  with  that 
mode  of  writing  would  relapse  into  illiterates  when  the 
Plioenician  alphabet  took  its  place  ;^  much  more  reason- 
able is  it  to  suppose  that  this  discovery  would  be  an 
immense  stimulus  to  them.  We  need  no  longer,  three- 
fore,  wonder  that  among  the  towns  taken  by  Joshua  was 
one  called  Kirjath-sepher,  Booh-town  (Josh.  xv.  15  ;  Judges 
i.  11),  or  Kirjath-^annah  (Josh.  xv.  49) ;  or  that  a  lad 
caught  at  the  roadside  was  able  to  write  down  the  names 
of  the  chief  men  of  Succoth  in  the  time  of  the  Judges 
(Judges  viii.  14,  Eevised  Version).  ISTay,  we  need  not 
wonder,  as  otherwise  we  naturally  do,  that  the  Old  Testa- 
ment gives  no  account  of  provision  for  teaching,  or  any 
hint  of  schools  for  instruction  of  youth.  In  all  proba- 
bility— in  view  of  tliis  discovery — education  was  a  much 
more  general  thing  than  we  are  usually  led  to  suppose. 

If  the  people  of  Canaan  thus  at  an  early  period  had 
attained  a  literary  activity  of  this  degree,  scholars  of 
Wellhausen's  school,  who  derive  so  much  of  Israel's  cul- 
ture from  the  Canaanites,  can  liardly  refuse  to  allow  a 
considerable  attainment  in  literary  power  to  the  Israelites 
at  a  much  earlier  period  than  the  eighth  century.  At 
least  they  cannot  say  that,  owing  to  want  of  culture,  Israel 
could  not  have  developed  some  literature  long  before  that 
time.  Given  the  ability  to  write,  the  art  must  have 
been  kept  alive  by  exercise,  and  handed  on  by  education 

1  The  Egyptian  writing  already  had  alphabetical  signs  ;  and  it  is  gener- 
ally supposed  that  a  Semitic  people  living  in  Egypt  (it  may  have  been 
tlie  Hyksos)  carried  out  the  hint  thus  given  and  developed  a  proper 
alphabet.  See  Isaac  Taylor's  'The  Alphabet,'  vol.  i.  chap,  ii,  ;  Stade's 
Hebrew  Grammar,  §  18. 


Transmission  of  Songs.  -79 

.'of  some  kiiiJ.  The  existence  of  finished  composition  at 
the  time  at  which  we  start,  and  the  general  ability  to  read 
which  is  thereby  implied,  can  only  be  explained  by  a  con- 
siderable period  of  preparation  and  exercise.  The  question 
would  then  remain  whether  tliere  is  any  time,  or  whether 
there  are  any  periods,  otherwise  suitable  for  stimulating 
and  maintaining  such  an  activity,  and  whether  we  can 
detect  traces  of  its  actual  existence  before  the  century  to 
wdiich  we  are  confining  ourselves. 

To  begin  with  old  songs,  there  is  now  no  longer  tlie 
necessity  to  suppose  that  they  were  handed  down  orally 
for  want  of  the  power  to  write.  The  song  of  Deborah, 
for  instance,  which  admittedly  bears  the  stamp  of  the 
age  to  which  it  relates,  may  have  come  down  in  writing 
_^yen  from  that  period.  The  Montenegrins  are  in  the 
habit  of  writing  contemporary  history  in  tlie  form  of 
ballads ;  ^  and  the  women  of  the  modern  Bedawin  stir  up 
the  valour  of  their  husbands  by  improvised  songs.^  The 
custom  is  therefore  ancient ;  and  if  the  power  to  write  is 
also  ancient,  it  is  not  necessary  to  suppose  that  such  songs 
were  entirely  left  to  oral  transmission.  Again,  the  "  legal 
documents  and  family  reminiscences  "  out  of  which  Well- 
hausen  allows  that  early  history  was  written,  could  have 
been  of  very  ancient  date,  and  of  much  more  voluminous 
compass  than  he  supposes ;  for  the  writing  on  stone  which 
he  thinks  was  the  practice  at  the  earliest  times,  turns  out 
to  have  been  a  writing  on  clay  tablets ;  and  judging  from 
the  contents  of  the  tablets  of  Tell-el-Amarna,  they  may 
have  been  the  depositories  of  very  minute  and  multifa- 
rious details.     Sayce,  indeed,  has  long  supposed  that  ex- 

1  Hanke,  Hist,  of  Servia,  Bolm's  transl.,  p.  411  ff.     Cf.  p.  49  ff. 
'^  See  Mrs  Finn's  interesting  paper  in    Quarterly   Statement   of  the 
Palestine  Exploration  Fund,   1879,  p.   42. 


80  Tlie  ''Earlier  Pro^phets." 

cavations  at  Kirjath-seplier  or  Tyre  may  reveal  buried 
libraries  of  this  material  such  as  have  been  unearthed 
at  Nineveh. 

Even  if  we  find  compositions  dating  ostensibly  from  a 
time  at  which  writing  is  not  known  to  have  been  practised, 
it  is  not  absolutely  necessary  to  regard  them  as  composi- 
tions of  a  later  age ;  for  oral  tradition,  for  certain  kinds  of 
literature,  is  stronger  than  we  might  at  first  sight  suppose. 
Max  MuUer,  writing  on  this  subject,^  after  stating  that 
written  literature  is  a  very  late  invention  in  most  countries, 
and  that  in  India  we  have  no  trace  of  books  before  the  fifth 
century  B.C.,  says :  "  It  is  true  that  oral  tradition,  before 
the  invention  of  writing  and  printing,  had  proved  itself  a 
very  safe  guardian  of  poetry,  and  few  would  doubt  that 
the  earliest  poetry  which  we  know  in  India  and  Greece 
goes  back  at  least  to  1000  B.c.  But  it  may  go  back,  for 
all  we  know,  to  2000  or  3000  B.C."  Other  things  than 
poetry,  however,  can  be  so  preserved.  Jerome  ^  mentions 
that  Jewish  children  were  taught  to  say  by  heart  the 
Genealogies;  and  I  myself  came  across  a  shopkeeper  in 
the  East  who  could  repeat,  without  the  book,  the  first 
chapter  of  St  Matthew,  but  could  with  difficulty  read  a 
few  verses  from  the  first  chapter  of  St  John.  It  is  to  be 
observed  that,  as  in  this  case,  the  cultivation  of  memory 
does  not  cease  with,  nor  is  superseded  by,  the  introduction 
of  writing  and  printing.  Children  in  modern  Eastern 
schools  perform  feats  of  memory  that  are  almost  incred- 
ible ;  but  the  passages  repeated  are  committed  to  memory 
from  the  printed  page.  In  view  of  such  facts,  it  should 
not  excite  so  much  surprise  or  suspicion  that  we  have 

1  '  Good  Words '  for  August  1887. 

2  On  Titus  iii.  9— Calmet's  Diet,  article  "Genealogies."  Of.  Prol.  to 
Ecclus.,  and  Ecclus.  xxxviii.  24,  26  ;  xxxix,  1-11, 


Occasions  for  Literary  Activity. 


compositions  in  the  Old  Testament  professing  to  come 
from  a  very  early  time. 

Turning  now  from  tliese  indications  of  the  ability  to 
write,  if  we  search  for  historical  occasions  which  may 
have  stimulated  it  into  exercise,  we  naturally  look  fori 
the  rise  of  a  national  literature  at  a  time  of  some  active  f 
stirring  of  the  national  life.  Times  when  nations  have 
achieved  something  are  times  when  they  wish  to  record 
what  they  have  done ;  times  when  they  brace  themselves 
up  for  a  great  effort  are  those  times  in  which  feeling  and 
purpose  seek  to  stamp  themselves  in  permanent  form  in 
writing.  Such  times  there  were  long  before  the  period  of 
the  Syrian  wars.  The  period  of  Moses  is  such  a  time,  at 
which,  if  there  is  any  truth  at  all  in  the  traditions  regard- 
ing it,  the  art  of  writing,  if  known,  as  it  is  admitted  to 
have  been,  would  have  found  exercise  in  formal  composi- 
tion.^ The  statements  here  and  there  in  the  Pentateuch, 
that  Moses  wrote  this  and  that,  are  not  mere  guesses  or 
embellishments  by  a  later  writer,  for  such  a  one  would 
have  more  probably  ascribed  to  him  the  whole  Pentateuch. 
Moreover,  tlie  references  to  the  '  Book  of  the  Wars  of  the 
Lord '  and  the  '  Book  of  Jashar '  scarcely  look  like  indica- 
tions that  the  works  in  question  were  almost  contempo- 
raneous: they  rather  suggest  the  inference  that  literary 
treasures  were  already  existent  and  recognised ;  and  the 
slight  notices  of  writing  at  succeeding  times  give  the 
impression  that  writing  was  not  an  innovation,  but  a 
matter  of  course.  Nor  are  there  wanting  other  suitable 
times  anterior  to  the  eighth  century.  Such  are  the  times 
of  Samuel  and  David,  when  the  national  spirit  was  deeply 
stirred  and  national  expectations  at  the  strongest  tension. 
Such  also   is   the  time  of  Solomon,  when  the   building 

^  Rawlinson — Moses,  His  Life  and  Times,  pp.  30,  31. 


82  The  ''Earlier  Prophets." 

of  the  Temple  and  palace  at  Jerusalem  quickened  a 
new  industrial  life,  and  when  luxury  demanded  an  in- 
crease of  agriculture,  and  was  fed  by  the  commerce  in 
which  the  royal  fleet  was  engaged — not  to  speak  of  the 
activity  and  enterprise  of  the  dynasty  of  Omri  in  the 
northern  kingdom.  Any  or  all  of  these  periods,  anterior 
to  the  eighth  century,  were  just  such  as  would  have 
quickened  into  exercise  a  power  jvhich  was  certainly 
possessed  by  Israel,  and  would  have  been  favourable  to 
the  production  of  a  literature  of  a  national  kind.  The 
point  is,  that  the  Hebrews  did  know  the  art  of  writing, 
and  therefore  needed  only  some  such  stimulus  to  develop 
it  into  that  of  literary  composition.  What  is  insisted  on 
is  that  writing,  including  reading,  implies  some  sort  of 
education.  Whether  the  people  as  a  whole  had  this 
benefit  or  not,  there  must  have  been  provision  for  impart- 
ing instruction  in  the  circles  where  reading  and  writing 
were  possessed ;  and  as  we  have  seen,  Sayce  argues,  from 
the  existence  of  the  clay  tablets  referred  to,  that_schools 
must  have  existed  all  over  the  country  before  the  exodus. 
A  similar  conclusion  must  be  drawn  in  regard  to  re- 
ligious instruction.  When  we  find  an  age  like  that  of 
Amos  and  Hosea  in  which  religious  discourse  was  com- 
mon and  well  understood,  and  a  religious  vocabulary  well 
developed,  we  must  conclude  that  by  some  means,  formal 
or  informal,  this  power  to  converse  on  religious  subjects 
had  been  produced  and  fostered.  Keligion  and  religious 
conversation  were  clearly  not  things  confined  to  learned 
or  professional  circles,  but  were  matters  of  popular  inter- 
est. Can  we  find  traces  of  anything  that  could  have  fos- 
tered this  as  a  popular  activity  ?  The  so-called  "  schools 
of  the  prophets  "  have  been  the  subject  of  much  fanciful 
speculation,  and  modern  critical  writers  make  very  merry 


Pro;plietic  Societies  in  SamueVs  Time,  83 

over  those  who  see  in  them  anything  like  an  educational 
institution.  But  in  spite  of  the  exaggerated  importance 
that  has  been  assigned  to  them,  and  in  spite  of  the  ridicule 
of  the  critics,  the  subject  is  worth  consideration,  when  we 
are  in  search  of  some  link  that  will  connect  a  non-literary 
with  a  literary  age. 

Let  us  go  back  to  the  books  of  Samuel,  which,  whatever 
may  be  the  date  of  their  composition,  are  admitted  to 
contain  authentic  information  of  the  times  to  which  they 
relate^    The  rude  and  unsettled   age  of  the  Judges   is 


passing  away.  The  lead  in  national  affairs  which  had 
been  taken  by  local  heroes  from  time  to  time  as  occasion 
called  them  forth,  is  now  in  the  hands  of  Samuel,  whose 
position  resembles  that  of  Moses  and  Joshua.  In  his 
time  we  see  springing  up  two  national  institutions,  the 
monarchy  and  prophecy,  through  whose  influences  the 
civil  and  religious  institutions  of  Israel  are  to  acquire 
a  more  organised  form.  As  to  Samuel's  own  activity,  "  all 
Israel,  from  Dan  to  Beersheba,  knew  that  he  was  estab- 
lished to  be  a  prophet  of  the  Lord  "  (1  Sam.  iii.  20) :  "  He 
judged  Israel  all  the  days  of  his  life ;  and  went  from  year 
to  year  in  circuit  to  Beth-el,  to  Gilgal  and  Mizpeh,  and 
judged  Israel  in  all  those  places.  And  his  return  was  to 
Ramah;  for  there  was  his  house"  (1  Sam.  vii.  15-17). 
What,  however,  is  of  special  interest  for  us  at  present  is 
the  mention  for  the  first  time  of  certain  societies  or  bands 
of  prophets  in  Samuel's  days;  and  in  spite  of  Stade's 
sneer  that  the  so-called  "  schools  of  the  prophets "  have 
been  in  ancient  and  even  in  modern  times  a  favourite 
hobby  with  those  who  delight  in  fanciful  and  dilettante 
study  of  the  Old  Testament,^  I  must  dwell  for  a  little  on 
this  remarkable  feature  of  the  religious  history  of  Israel. 

^  Goschichte,  i.  p.  478,  note. 


Si  The  "Earlier  Prophets." 

I  do  not,  in  the  meantime,  call  them  schools,  nor  do  I 
think  they  were  such  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  the  word ; 
but  I  think  it  will  appear  exceedingly  probable  that  they 
exercised  a  powerful  educational  influence  even  from  a 
literary  point  of  view. 

The  first  mention  of  these  prophetic  bands  is  on  the 
occasion  of  Samuel  taking  leave  of  Saul  after  announcing 
to  him  that  he  was  to  be  king.  The  Benjaniite  is  told 
that  when  he  conies  to  the  hill  [Gibeah]  of  God,  he  will 
meet  a  company  of  prophets  "  coming  down  from  the  high 
place  with  a  psaltery,  and  a  tabret,  and  a  pipe,  and  a 
harp,"  &c.  (1  Sam.  x.  5,  6).  Later  on,  when  David  fled 
from  Saul  to  Samuel,  he  came  and  dwelt  in  Naioth ;  .  .  . 
and  when  Saul  sent  messengers  to  take  him,  they  encoun- 
tered the  company  of  the  prophets  prophesying,  and  Samuel 
standing  as  their  head,  &c.  (1  Sam.  xix.  18-24).  We  shall 
have  to  speak  of  this  movement  in  its  religious  aspect  by- 
and-by.  In  the  meantime  we  take  it  as  certain  that  there 
was,  in  Samuel's  days,  some  society  of  prophets,  bound 
together  by  some  religious  tie,  and  occupied  with  some 
kind  of  religious  functions.  These  notices  bring  us  down 
to  the  eve  of  David's  reign  ;  and  we  hear  no  more  of  such 
associations  in  the  times  of  Solomon,  or  of  the  kings  who 
reigned  immediately  after  the  disruption;  but  an  inci- 
dental notice  (1  Kings  xx.  35)  relating  to  the  time  of) 
Ahab,  of  "  a  certain  man  of  the  sons  of  the  prophets,"  as 
if  the  order  was  well  known,  makes  it  probable  that  the 
associations,  in  some  form  or  other,  were  never  broken  upj 
When  we  come  to  the  time  of  Elisha  we  have  quite  a 
number  of  detailed  notices,  which  show  us  that  by  that 
time  these  societies  were  numerous  and  influential.  When 
Elijah  is  taking  leave  of  Elisha,  the  two  pass  from  Gilgal 
to  Beth-el,  and  from  thence  to  Jericho  ;  and  at  both  places 


Times  of  ElisJia.  85 

the  sons  of  the  prophets  come  out  to  meet  them.  Prob- 
ably these  places  only  are  mentioned  because  they  lay  in 
the  way,  and  there  may  have  been  similar  societies  else- 
where. At  Gilgal  itself  Elisha  is  seen  with  the  sons  of 
the  prophets  sitting  before  him  (2  Kings  iv.  38)  ;  and  a 
little  farther  on  they  complain  to  him  that  the  place  of 
their  settlement  is  too  strait  for  them,  and  propose  to 
bring  timber  from  the  Jordan  to  make  a  more  commodious 
dwelling  (2  Kings  vi.  1  ff).  Elisha,  however,  does  not 
confine  himself  to  Gilgal,  but  is  found  dwelling  also  at 
Carmel  (2  Kings  ii.  25)  and  at  Samaria  (2  Kings  vi.  32). 
The  prophets  seem  to  have  been  a  numerous  body  in  the 
country.  In  the  time  of  Ahab  it  is  said  that  when  Jezebel 
cut  off  the  prophets  of  Jahaveh,  Obadiah  took  a  hundred 
of  them,  and  hid  them  by  fifty  in  a  cave  (1  Kings  xviii.  4). 
At  the  parting  of  Elijah  from  Elisha,  fifty  of  the  sons  of  the 
prophets  of  Jericho  stood  to  view  afar  off  as  the  two  took 
their  way  to  the  Jordan  (2  Kings  ii.  1-7) ;  and  in  Elisha's 
community  at  Gilgal  one  hundred  are  mentioned  as  pres- 
ent on  one  occasion  (2  Kings  iv,  38-44).  Finally,  we  have 
incidental  notices  as  to  their  organisation  and  mode  of 
life.  The  head  of  the  society  is  treated  with  the  greatest 
respect,  as  we  see  in  the  cases  of  Samuel  and  Elislia,  being 
csllQdi  father  or  master  (1  Sam.  x.  12  ;  2  Kings  ii.  3).  He 
is  attended  by  a  famulus,  or  intimate  servant.  Elisha  is 
described  as  the  man  who  "  poured  water  on  the  hands  of 
Elijah"  (2  Kings  iii.  11)  ;  and  Elisha  is  served  in  the  same 
manner  by  Gehazi  (2  Kings  iv.,  v.,  viii.)  Elisha's  ap- 
pointment as  his  master's  successor  is  ordered  to  be  sol- 
emnised by  anointing  (1  Kings  xix.  16) — though  there  is 
no  mention  of  its  being  done;  and  lastly,  though  they 
lived  together  in  communities,  wearing,  as  some  suppose, 
coarse  garments,  and  nourishing  themselves  on  plain  fare 


86  The  ''Earlier  Prophets" 

(2  Kings  iv.  38  £f. ;  1  Kings  xix.  6),  they  were  not  neces- 
sarily celibates ;  for  we  hear  of  a  "  certain  woman  of  the 
wives  of  the  sons  of  the  prophets/'  who  had  fallen  into 
poverty  after  her  husband's  death,  and  in  whose  behalf 
Elisha  wrought  a  miracle  to  save  her  from  seeing  her  two 
sons  taken  to  be  bondmen  by  her  creditor  (2  Kings  iv.  1). 

These  notices,  drawn  mainly  from  those  stories  of  the 
prophets  incorporated  in  the  books  of  Kings,  which  ad- 
mittedly belong  to  this  first  period  of  literary  composi- 
tion, may  be  accepted  as  the  statement  of  what  every 
one  believed  at  the  time  they  were  written ;  they  are  too 
numerous,  too  varied,  and  too  detailed,  to  be  treated  as 
^ftertlioughts,  or  idealising  of  facts;  and,  in  short,  may 
be  taken  as  historical,  since  there  was  no  object  to  be 
served  by  inventing  them.  They  amount  to  this:  that 
these  societies  or  associations,  whatever  was  their  precise 
constitution,  were  a  recognised  thing,  well  rooted  in  Israel 
a  century  or  so  before  Amos  wrote.  Now  when  we  turn 
to  Amos  himself,  we  find  proof  that  they  were  equally 
well  known  and  recognised  in  his  days.  "  I  am  no  pro- 
phet, nor  son  of  a  prophet "  (Amos  vii.  14,  15),  he  says, 
disclaiming  connection  with  them  for  himself  (in  what 
sense  we  shall  see  by-and-by),  but  attesting  their  exist- 
ence. It  is  not  necessary  at  present  to  follow  their 
history  farther  down.  What  has  been  said  has  been 
advanced  to  show  that  the  appearance  of  the  men  usually 
called  writing  prophets  was  not  a  sudden  thing  without 
any  preparation,  and  more  particularly  because  possibly 
we  may  have  here  the  link  connecting  the  so-called  non- 
literary  with  the  alleged  first  literary  age. 

Those  who  would  minimise  the  culture  and  attainments 
of  the  pre-prophetic  age,  as  they  call  it,  of  course  make 
very  little  of  these  associations  of  the  prophets  as  elevat- 


Wellhausen  and  the  Nebiim.  87 

ing  influences  in  the  nation ;  in  fact  tliey  ridicule  them  as 
disorderly  and  disreputable  societies.  This  is  how  Well- 
hausen speaks  of  the  prophetic  bands  in  Samuel's  time :  ^ 
"  Troops  of  ecstatic  enthusiasts  showed  themselves  here  and 
there,  and  went  about  with  musical  accompaniments  in 
processions  which  often  took  the  form  of  wild  dances; 
even  men  of  the  most  sedate  temperament  were  sometimes 
smitten  with  the  contagion,  and  drawn  into  the  charmed 
circle.  In  such  a  phenomenon,  occurring  in  the  East,  there 
was  nothing  intrinsically  strange ;  among  the  Canaanites, 
such  *  Nebiim ' — for  so  they  were  styled — had  long  been 
familiar,  and  they  continued  to  exist  in  the  country  after 
the  old  fashion,  long  after  their  original  character,  so  far 
as  Israel  was  concerned,  had  been  wholly  lost.  The  new 
thing  at  this  juncture  was  that  this  spirit  passed  over 
upon  Israel,  and  that  the  best  members  of  the  community 
were  seized  by  it.  It  afforded  an  outlet  for  the  sup- 
pressed excitement  of  the  nation." 

The  incongruity  of  setting  Samuel  at  the  head  of  such 
a  noisy  crew  (though  the  best  members  of  the  commun- 
ity are  admitted  to  have  been  infected)  Wellhausen  gets 
over  by  the  assumption  of  two  contradictory  traditions. 
The  story  of  Saul's  appearance  at  Naioth  in  Eamah 
where  David  was,  and  of  his  being  overpowered  by  the 
prophetic  influence,  is,  wo  are  told,^  "a  pious  carica- 
ture ;  the  point  can  be  nothing  but  Samuel's  and  David's 
enjoyment  of  the  disgrace  of  the  naked  king;"  and 
Wellhausen,  who  is  our  caricaturist  for  the  moment, 
goes  on  to  say:  "For  the  general  history  of  the  tradi- 
tion the  most  interesting  circumstance  is  that  Samuel 
has  here  become  the  head  of  a  school  of  prophets, 
and  the  leader  of  their  exercises.     In  the  original  view 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  449.  2  Ibid.,  p.  268. 


88  The  ''Earlier  Prophets." 

of  the  matter  (cliaps.  ix.,  x.)  he  appears  alone  and  iiule- 
pendent,  and  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  companies  of 
the  ecstatics,  the  Nebiim.  He  is  a  Bdeh  or  seer,  not  a 
Nabi  or  prophet.  True,  it  is  asserted  in  the  gloss  (ix.  9) 
that  the  two  words  mean  the  same  thing — that  what  is 
now  called  Nabi  was  formerly  called  Eoeh.  But  that  is 
scarcely  quite  correct.  The  author  of  ix.,  x.  knows  the 
name  Nabi  very  well  too,  but  he  never  applies  it  to 
Samuel ;  he  only  uses  it  in  the  plui'al,  of  the  troops  of 
Jehovah — intoxicated  dervishes." 

As  to  the  later  associations  of  prophets,  he  says:^ 
"In  the  time  of  Ahab  and  Jehu,  the  Nebiim  were  a 
widespread  body,  and  organised  in  orders  of  their 
own,  but  they  were  not  highly  respected;  the  average 
of  them  were  miserable  fellows,  who  ate  out  of  the 
king's  hand,  and  were  treated  with  disdain  by  mem- 
bers of  the  leading  classes.  Amos  of  Ttkoa,  who,  it  is 
true,  belonged  to  a  younger  generation,  felt  it  an  insult 
to  be  counted  one  of  them.  Elijah  and  Elisha  rose  cer- 
tainly above  the  level  of  their  order ;  but  the  first,  whose 
hands  remained  pure,  while  he  no  doubt  produced  a  great 
impression  at  the  time  by  his  fearless  words,  effected 
nothing  against  the  king,  and  quite  failed  to  draw  the 
people  over  to  his  side;  while  Elisha,  who  did  effect 
something,  made  use  of  means  which  could  not  bear  the 
light,  and  which  attest  rather  the  weakness  than  the 
strength  of  prophecy  in  Israel.'* 

Stade  writes  in  the  same  vein,  and  is  even  more  lively. 
The  ancient  seer,  according  to  him,  was  one  who  had 
second-sight ;  but  the  prophets  were  distinguished  from 
them  in  that  "  they  appear  in  bands  and  swarms,  some- 
times crowding  into  fixed  places,  at  other  times  wandering 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  293. 


Stade  and  the  Dervishes.  89 

through  the  country,  always  infecting  new  individuals 
and  drawing  them  into  their  ranks.  Clairvoyance  with 
them  gives  place  to  the  noisy  utterances  of  possession. 
God's  hand  moves  them  so  mightily  that  they  rave  and 
roar,  dance  and  spring,  and  pour  out  in  torrents  whatever 
He  suggests  to  them.  The  accession  of  this  passionate 
excitement  is  skilfully  aided  by  noisy  music.  ...  In 
short,  from  the  descriptions  that  we  have  of  prophetic 
activity  in  ancient  times,  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  here 
is  a  manifestation  of  the  same  '  sacred  disease '  which 
inspired  the  servants  of  Dionysos  even  to  frenzy,  wdiich 
led  the  priests  of  the  Syrian  goddess  to  wound  and  maim 
themselves,  which  can  be  observed  even  at  the  present 
day  in  the  dervishes  of  the  Mohammedan  East,  and 
among  them  also  produces  such  wonderful  feats  and  such 
repulsive  acts,  and  which  lends  to  such  fanatics  as  these 
the  character  of  holiness,  even  when  the  possession  impels 
them  to  immoral  deeds."  ^ 

All  this  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  a  miserable 
travesty  of  the  accounts  which  lie  before  us :  it  seems 
to  me,  further,  to  be  a  mistake  from  the  point  of  view 
of  those  writers  themselves.  For  the  position  taken 
up  leaves  little  room  for  the  development  which  they 
are  so  fond  of  tracing,  and  practically  forces  them  to 
regard  the  writing  prophets  as  sudden  apparitions,  with- 
out anything  in  the  antecedent  history  out  of  which 
they  could  have  been  developed.  Apart  from  this,  how- 
ever, I  must  particularly  refer  to  the  attitude  of  Samuel 
and  Amos,  at  the  two  ends  of  tlie  series,  to  these  pro- 
phetic companies.     The  endeavour  is  made,  as  it  has  been 

^  Stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  476  ff.  The  reader  should,  however,  here 
turn  to  1  Kings  xviii.  26  ff.,  and  contrast  the  bearing  of  Elijah  with  that 
of  the  prophets  of  Baal. 


90  The  ''Earlier  Prophets." 

seen,  to  dissociate  both  men  from  the  prophetic  companies, 
but  I  think  without  the  slightest  ground.  Wellhausen's 
statements  amount  to  this :  Samuel  stood  alone  and 
independent,  apart  from  the  Nebiim,  although  "  the  best 
members  of  the  community  were  seized  by"  the  spirit 
that  prevailed ;  and  further,  a  later  tradition  put  him  at 
the  head  of  the  school,  although  the  men  composing  these 
schools  were  for  the  most  part  a  miserable  lot  of  fellows, 
and  Amos  disdained  to  be  counted  as  belonging  to  them. 
Surely  the  later  tradition  did  not  mean  to  degrade 
Samuel  by  putting  him  at  the  head  of  the  prophets ;  and 
yet,  if  they  were  generally  viewed  as  is  represented,  it  was 
no  honour.  The  truth  is,  there  is  no  reason,  except  the 
requirements  of  Wellhausen's  theory,  for  doubting  what 
is  said  of  Samuel's  connection  with  the  prophets.  And 
then  as  to  Amos,  I  am  sure  that  no  one  but  a  modern 
critic  could  interpret  his  words  as  they  do.  The  priest 
of  Beth-el,  Amaziah,  had  said  to  him,  "0  thou  seer,^ 
go,  flee  thee  away  into  the  land  of  Judah,  and  there 
eat  bread,  and  prophesy  there,"  &c. ;  to  which  Amos 
replied,  "  I  am  no  prophet,  neither  the  son  of  a  prophet ; 
but  I  am  an  herdman,  and  a  dresser  of  sycamore  trees  : 
and  Jahaveh  took  me  as  I  followed  the  flock,  and  Jaha- 
veh  said  unto  me,  Go,  prophesy  unto  my  people  Israel" 
(Amos  vii.  12-15).  How  these  words  can  be  twisted 
into  an  expression  of  contempt  for  the  prophets  I  cannot 
conceive.     The  contrast  which  Amos  draws  is  between  a 

1  Wellhausen  strives  hard  to  make  out  that  the  names  Roeh  (seer)  and 
Nabi  (prophet)  had  different  significations  in  the  time  of  Samuel,  and  that 
the  distinction  only  gradually  faded  away.  This  he  does  in  order  to  place 
the  Roeh  above  the  flagellant  Nabi,  as  he  terms  him.  It  is  worth  noticing, 
however,  that,  in  the  passage  of  Amos  referred  to,  the  two  terms  seem  to 
be  convertible  ;  and  also  that  in  Gen.  xx.  7  (which  belongs  to  E. — see  Note 
VIII.)  Abraham  is  called  a  Nabi. 


Amos  and  the  PropJiets.  91 

professional  prophet  and  a  humble  herdman  following  the 
flock  :  and  the  only  fair  inference  to  be  drawn  is,  that  he 
did  not  pretend  to  any  trained  skill  in  prophesying  ;  that 
he  did  not  derive  his  commission  from  any  order  of  men ; 
that  the  truth  he  delivered  was  not  learned  in  any 
I  school.  Jahaveh  took  him.  He  may  mean  this  simply 
and  nothing  more  ;  if  he  means  to  give  any  opinion  of  the 
prophets  and  the  sons  of  the  prophets,  it  is  more  likely 
to  be  favourable  than  the  reverse,  as  if  he  had  said,  "  I 
do  not  pretend  to  the  skill  or  authority  of  a  prophet ;  I 
am  but  a  common  peasant."  But  we  need  be  in  no 
doubt  on  the  subject ;  for  Amos  elsewhere,  in  recounting 
God's  great  deeds  for  His  people,  mentions  the  giving  of 
prophets  (ii.  11).  Who,  we  ask,  were  the  prophets  to 
whom  he  could  here  allude  as  a  class  of  God-appointed 
men  ?  We  know  of  none  that  were  not  connected  with 
the  prophetic  class  with  which  our  critics  would  have 
Amos  disdain  to  be  identified.  The  whole  interpretation 
is  forced  ;  and  though,  if  the  theory  were  proved,  the  words 
of  Amos  in  this  passage  might  be  construed  to  agree  with 
it — making  him,  however,  inconsistent  with  himself  in 
another  place — the  words  cannot  by  any  means  be  taken 
as  even  a  plausible  support  of  it. 

I  take  it,  then,  that  there  were  societies  or  guilds  of 
prophets  from  Samuel's  time,  and  that  the  best  men  of 
the  time  were  either  connected  with  them,  or  regarded 
them  as  composed  of  men  devoted  to  Jahaveh's  service ; 
and  I  think  we  may  find  in  them  something  that  will 
help  to  explain  the  literary  and  religious  features  of  the 
century  we  are  considering.  We  do  not  know  much  of 
the  occupations  of  these  sons  of  the  prophets;  and  of 
their  earlier  societies,  particularly,  in  the  time  of  Samuel, 
we  only  obtain  glimpses.     But  this  we  know :  they  had 


9  2  The  ''Earlier  PropTietsr 

a  religious  basis;  for  though  Wellliausen  says  they 
arose  out  of  the  oppression  of  the  Philistines,  he  admits 
that  "  religion  and  patriotism  were  then  identical."  We 
find  also  that  music  was  practised  among  them  (and 
even  as  late  as  the  time  of  Elisha,  that  prophet  is  de- 
scribed as  calling  for  a  minstrel  to  play  before  he  de- 
livered his  prophecy — 2  Kings  iii.  15).  ITow  as  to  the 
former,  we  know  that  religion  combined  with  patriotism 
characterised  all  the  prophets;  and  their  patriotism  ex- 
jDressed  itself  in  what  we  may  call  a  theory  or  philosophy^ 
of  the  national  history,  the  chief  elements  of  whiclTwere 
a  conviction  that  Jahaveh  had  specially  guided  the  nation 
in  the  past,  and  a  belief  that  He  had  in  store  for  it  a  noble 
future.  The  germs  of  such  a  theory  of  the  history  were 
present  in  the  "religion  tinged  with  patriotism"  of  the 
very  earliest  prophetic  movement.  Now  it  will  be  evi- 
dent there  is  room  here  for  study,  and  in  this  germ  we 
have  the  beginnings  of  the  Biblical  conception  of  history. 
The  events  of  the  past,  the  movements  of  the  present,  the 
prospects  of  tlie  future,  are  of  deep  interest  to  men  pos- 
sessed with  this  central  idea  of  their  national  life.  If  I 
mistake  not,  Wellhausen  himself  bears  unwilling  testi- 
mony to  this  fact.i  Summing  up  his  critical  estimate  of 
the  historical  books,  he  says  that  the  specific  character  of 
Israelite  history,  which  has  chiefly  led  to  its  being  called 
sacred  history,  rests  for  the  most  part  on  the  repainting  of 
the  original  picture.  But  he  adds,  "  The  discolouring  in- 
fluences begin  early ; "  and  by  this  he  means  "  that  uni- 
form stamp  impressed  on  the  tradition  by  men  who 
regarded  history  exclusively  from  the  point  of  view  of 
their  own  principles."  In  fact,  there  is  "  a  religious  influ- 
ence, wliich  in  the  books  of  Samuel  and  Kings  turns  out 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  293  f. 


Froj)7ietic  Discolouring  of  History.  93 

to  be  tlie  prophetical  one."  He  will  not  allow,  however, 
tliat  it  is  to  the  prophets  that  the  Hebrew  people'  owe 
their  history  as  a  wliole ;  and  "  least  of  all  can  the  col- 
leges of  the  B'ne  Nebiim  ["sons  of  the  prophets"]  at 
Gilgal  and  other  places,  be  regarded  as  nurseries  of  liis- 
toric  tradition."  But  when  he  speaks  of  tlie  "old  books 
of  the  people,"  which  the  prophets  remodelled  for  the 
edification  of  the  new  generation,  we  must  not  forget 
that,  according  to  his  own  estimate  of  the  literary  his- 
tory, tliese  must  have  been  produced  just  about  the  time 
that  these  colleges  of  the  prophets  flourished ;  and  he 
neither  tells  us  who  could  have  been  the  writers  of 
them,  nor  who  w^ere  the  "  earlier  prophets  "  to  whom  the 
writing  prophets  refer  as  their  forerunners.  In  point  of 
fact,  the  very  earliest  prophets  are  historians,  politicians, 
and  prophets  in  the  narrower  sense  of  the  word;  and 
there  is  no  reason  to  doubt  that  the  societies,  even  of 
Samuel's  days,  called  into  existence  in  the  way  Wellhausen 
describes,  had  made  a  start  on  all  the  three  lines.  We 
know  that  some  of  the  writing  prophets  were  also  his- 
torians ;  and  even  modern  writers  admit  that  history 
begins  about  the  time  of  Samuel.  It  is  remarkable  that 
the  book  of  Chronicles,  which,  of  course,  the  critics  will 
not  admit  to  be  historical,  mentions,  besides  Samuel, 
among  the  early  writers  of  history,  Nathan  and  Gad, 
showing  a  belief  on  the  part  of  the  writer,  at  all  events, 
and  presumably  a  national  tradition,  that  these  earlier 
prophets  were  also  writers  of  history.  And  then  as  to 
the  musical  occupations  of  these  prophetic  companies, 
it  is  a  remarkable  thing  that  the  persistent  tradition  of 
the  nation  ascribes  to  David  the  chief  place  among  poets 
and  musicians,  and  that  these  associations  existed  in  his 
youth,  and  he  himself  is  seen  frequenting  them. 


94  The  "Earlier  Prophets" 

If  we  admit  the  existence  of  these  so-called  schools  at 
all,  we  must  give  the  inmates  something  to  do  connected 
with  the  religion  and  fortunes  of  the  nation.  Now,  as  we 
find  history  and  poetry  coming  into  prominence  just  after 
their  institution,  and  a  language  fully  developed  ready 
to  the  hand  of  those  who  wrote  in  the  eighth  century, 
and  as  we  have  no  knowledge  of  any  other  circles  in 
which  such  literary  exercises  could  be  carried  on,  it  is 
not  a  stretch  of  imagination,  but  a  safe  deduction,  that 
we  have  in  these  societies  of  the  prophets  something  that 
would  explain  what  would  otherwise  be  difficult  of  ex- 
planation—  the  sudden  appearance  of  finished  literary 
composition — if  that  is  a  fact ;  or  if  it  is  not,  something 
that  represents  an  earlier  stage  of  literary  activity.  The 
time  and  circumstances  of  the  first  appearance  of  these 
societies  are  such  as  would  give  an  impulse  to  religious 
life.  The  quickening  of  the  national  pulse  in  the  struggle 
with  the  Philistines,  the  revival  of  zeal  under  the  influ- 
ence of  Samuel,  the  retirement  of  some  kind  of  cenobite 
life,  and  the  contact  of  men  of  kindred  spirit  in  these 
societies — all  these  tended  to  create  or  develop  culture, 
and  would  likewise  be  powerful  factors  in  the  production 
of  the  religious  consciousness  of  the  time.  Given  the 
power  to  write,  and  such  incentives  as  these,  there  is  no 
reason  why  many  of  the  compositions  crowded  together 
into  the  so-called  first  literary  age  may  not  in  whole  or 
in  part  belong  to  an  earlier  period. 

In  view  of  an  activity  like  this,  we  are  not  so  much  at 
a  loss  to  understand  how  it  came  about  that  readers  were 
common  at  the  time  of  the  first  writing  prophets,  and  how 
the  religious  vocabulary  was  well  developed.  We  do  not 
require  to  suppose  that  these  societies  retained  within 
tiiemselves  all  the  culture  of  the  times— far  from  it  j  but 


The  goodly  Fellowship  of  the  Prophets.  95 

they  would  be  rallying-points  and  powerful  aids  to  its 
general  support  and  propagation.  We  have  also — what 
is  quite  in  keeping  with  the  references  of  Amos  and 
Hosea  to  former  prophets — a  succession  of  men  such  as 
Nathan,  Gad,  Iddo,  and  others,  who  must  be  taken  to  be 
actual  historical  characters,  and  who  are  described  as 
"prophets"  or  "seers."  We  have  no  reason  to  suppose 
that  they  were  of  a  class  opposed  to  or  out  of  harmony 
with  the  prophetic  companies.  If  it  is  not  to  such  men 
that  Amos  and  Hosea  refer,  we  know  of  no  others ;  if 
they  are  the  men,  then  we  get  men  of  flesh  and  blood  such 
as  were  the  prophets  whose  writings  are  before  us — men 
who  were  quite  capable  of  handing  on  the  lamp  of  learn- 
ing such  as  existed  in  that  age,  and,  what  was  of  more 
importance,  of  keeping  the  torch  of  religious  truth  burn- 
ing. It  is  not  a  great  stretch  of  imagination  to  think 
of  these  men,  in  their  intercourse  with  one  another,  and 
in  the  assemblies  of  the  people  that  gathered  about  them, 
encouraging  one  another  and  animating  one  another  by 
reciting  the  deeds  of  valour  and  the  victories  of  faith  of 
their  forefathers,  the  patriarchs  and  the  judges,  tuning 
their  harps  to  patriotic  religious  songs  composed  to  cel- 
ebrate memorable  deeds,  and  forecasting  the  future  of 
their  nation  which  such  deeds  led  them  to  expect.  If  we 
regard  men  like  these  as  the  natural  guardians  of  the 
popular  traditions,  we  shall  be  at  no  loss  to  understand 
how  these  traditions  are  tinged  with  religion,  nay,  steeped 
in  religion,  to  such  an  extent  as  to  mark  them  out  from 
the  popular  mythological  tales  of  other  early  nations. 
They  have  all  the  appearance,  not  of  tales  of  folk-lore 
gathered  up  from  the  mouths  of  the  people  and  touched 
up  for   a  national  and  religious   end,^  but  of  traditions 

1  Wellhausen,  p.  294. 


9 G  Tlie  ''Earlier  Prophets" 

piously  treasured  up,  brooded  over  and  protected  by  men 
who  of  old  were  imbued  with  religious  feeling  and  im- 
pressed with  the  conviction  of  a  Divine  Hand  guiding 
their  nation's  history.  Cut  and  carve  them  as  we  may, 
by  eliminating  "  later  additions,"  and  so  forth,  they  cannot 
be  resolved  ultimately  into  mere  fanciful  stories,  told  for 
amusement,  freaks  of  a  playful  imagination,  indulged  in 
for  their  own  sake.  In  the  simplest  narratives  there  are 
touches  of  insight ;  reduced  to  their  barest  originals  they 
are  pervaded  with  a  purpose.  By  the  time  of  Hosea  we 
can  see  (Hosea  xii.  3,  4,  12)  that  the  stories  of  the 
patriarchs  were  not  only  well  known,  but  used,  we  may 
say,  as  texts  for  discourses,  and  handled  in  a  homiletic 
and  didactic  manner — a  proof  that  they  had  been  long 
known  and  treasured  in  prophetic  circles,  and  were  re- 
garded not  as  odds  and  ends  of  stories,  but  as  parts  of  a 
connected  history. 

Our  purpose  is  not  primarily  to  inquire  into  the  origin 
and  mode  of  composition  of  the  earlier  historical  books, 
but  to  test  their  historical  value ;  and  our  present  argu- 
ment is  to  show  the  sort  of  men  who  were  the  guardians 
ctnd  vouchers  of  the  tradition.  The  point  to  which  we 
have  come,  however,  has  an  essential  bearing  on  the 
question  of  the  composition  of  the  books.  In  the 
Hebrew  canon  the  books  from  Joshua  on  to  the  Second 
Book  of  Kings  are  designated  "  the  earlier  prophets," 
the  idea  underlying  this  title  being  that  the  books 
proceeded  from  prophetic  men ;  and  a  fair  considera- 
tion of  the  facts  that  have  been  stated  will  lead 
to  the  conclusion  that  the  supposition  is  not  a  mere 
unfounded  conjecture.  It  is  remarked  by  Wellhausen, 
as  we  have  just  seen,  that  the  books  in  question  have  all 
a  strong  prophetic  tinge,  which,  of  course,  he  places  late. 


Topographical  Accuracy.  97 

But  it  is  also  admitted  that  parts  at  least  of  the  Looks 
of  Judges  and  Samuel,  and  an  element  in  the  book  of 
Genesis,  belong  to  the  first  literary  age.  Now,  if  it  should 
turn  out  that  tliis  first  literary  age  was  one  in  which 
prophetic  tendencies  were  well  developed,  or  at  least 
prophetic  principles  were  firmly  fixed  in  their  main  con- 
ceptions, there  will  be  no  necessity  of  separating  by  wide 
intervals  of  time  parts  of  the  same  narrative  which  other- 
wise hang  well  enough  together.  This  view  of  the  sub- 
ject, however,  will  be  more  fully  considered  in  the  next 
chapter.  In  the  meantime  attention  is  to  be  drawn 
here  to  another  feature  of  these  historical  books,  which 
is  closely  related  to  the  mode  of  their  composition  and 
their  historical  value — namely,  the  minute  accuracy  they 
exhibit  in  matters  of  topography. 

Perhaps  no  country  has  been  more  attentively  exam- 
ined in  connection  with  its  history  and  literature  than 
Palestine;  and  those  who  have  made  the  most  careful 
examination  have  testified  to  the  extraordinary  corre- 
spondence, to  the  minutest  detail,  between  the  Biblical 
accounts  and  the  localities  in  which  they  are  placed. 
This  does  not,  of  course,  warrant  us  in  saying  straightway 
that  the  narratives  are  strictly  historical,  but  it  has  an 
important  bearing  on  the  mode  of  composition  of  the 
books.  It  will,  on  reflection,  be  admitted  that  a  writer 
or  speaker  nowhere  runs  greater  risk  of  tripping  and 
falling  into  error  than  when  dealing  with  details  of 
topography.  It  is  a  case  in  which  mere  popular  and 
oral  recital  is  almost  sure  after  a  time  to  be  at  fault,  and 
in  which  memory  cannot  long  be  safely  trusted.  It  is 
also  to  be  noted  that  the  remarkable  physical  configu- 
ration of  Palestine,  and  the  graphic  pictorial  style  of 
Hebrew  diction,  made  tlie  danger  of  falling  into  mistakes 


'98  The  "Earlier  Prophdsr 

of  this  kind  immensely  greater.  Tlie  Hebrew  writers 
are  continually  painting  the  scene  of  their  narratives, 
not  only  reproducing  the  words  and  gestures  of  the 
speakers,  but  telling  us  how  they  "  lifted  up  their  eyes " 
and  saw  this  and  that  ;  and  the  conformation  of  the 
country  is  so  remarkable,  its  variations  of  scene,  climate, 
and  physical  condition  such,  that  the  accuracy  of  de- 
lineation, which  bears  the  closest  investigation,  is  nothing 
short  of  marvellous.  It  is  indeed  only  in  compara- 
tively recent  times  that  this  has  been  fully  brought 
to  light ;  for  not  only  the  Crusaders,  but  even  the  early 
Christian  monks  who  resided  in  the  country,  made 
mistakes  in  identifications  of  Biblical  sites,  which  it  has 
been  left  to  travellers  and  explorers  of  our  own  century 
to  rectify.^  It  would  not  be  difficult  to  find  in  modern 
authors  writing  from  memory  or  with  imperfect  informa- 
tion, instances  to  prove  how  easily  mistakes  may  be  fallen 
into.  Walter  Scott,  e.g.  (and  no  doubt  it  is  not  a  solitary 
instance),  makes  one  of  his  characters ^  speak  of  Eoseneath 
as  an  island,  a  kind  of  mistake  never  committed  by  a 
Biblical  writer.  An  instructive  example  may  be  taken 
from  a  passage  in  Wellhausen's  own  book,  in  which,  in 
connection  with  the  story  of  the  destruction  of  the  cities 
of  the  plain,  mention  is  made  of  "  the  smoke  of  the  furnace 
which  Abraham  saw  from  the  Jewish  shore  the  morning 
after  the  catastrophe."^     It  is  true  the  English  transla- 

1  The  Quarterly  Statements  of  the  Palestine  Exploration  Fund  are 
full  of  corrections  of  such  early  mistakes.  See,  e.g.,  the  Statements  for 
1875,  p.  89  fr.;  and  for  1876,  pp.  11  ff.,  37  f.,  168  ;  for  1877,  p.  33  ff.  To 
name  no  other  ]»laces,  Robinson  mentions  that  even  such  a  famous  place 
as  Beth-el  was  not  known  accurately  to  the  monks  for  centuries,  the  name 
of  the  true  site  being  preserved  solely  among  the  common  people. — Bib- 
lical Researches,  second  edition,  vol.  i.  p.  449. 

'^  Heart  of  Mid-Lothian,  chap.  xl.  ^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  325. 


Modern  Topographical  Mistakes.  99 

tion  makes  the  mistake  more  glaring;  but  even  in  the 
original  ^  the  words  do  not  accurately  represent  the  state- 
ment of  tlie  Biblical  writer,  according  to  which  ^  Abra- 
ham was  not  near  the  Dead  Sea  at  the  time  of  the 
occurrence,  but  at  Mamre,  and  could  not  even  have  seen 
the  shore.  What  the  narrator  says  is  that  Abraham 
"  got  up  early  in  the  morning  to  the  place  where  he  had 
stood  before  Jahaveh,"  and  that  "he  looked  toward 
Sodom  and  Gomorrah,  and  toward  all  the  land  of  the 
plain,  and  lo  1  the  smoke  of  the  country  went  up  as  the 
smoke  of  a  furnace."  It  is  a  great  distance  from  Hebron 
to  the  Dead  Sea,  and  mountains  intervene  for  the  most 
part.  Eobinson  tells  us  that  he  ascended  the  hills  to  the 
east  of  the  town  in  hopes  of  obtaining  a  view  of  the 
country,  but  the  prospect  was  limited  towards  the  east 
and  north  by  higlier  hills  near  at  hand.  Next  day,  how- 
ever, on  ascending  the  hill  to  the  west,  he  found  the 
prospect  towards  the  east  and  south  and  west  very  ex- 
tensive, Kerak  (on  the  eastern  side  of  the  Dead  Sea) 
being  very  clearly  distinguishable.*  A  more  glaring  mis- 
take is  made  in  Lenormant's  'Ancient  History  of  the 
East,'  where  we  have  such  a  collocation  as  this :  "  Be- 
tween Bethel  and  Hai  in  tlie  rich  pastures  of  the  lower 
Jordan,"*  though  these  places  are  far  from  the  river. 
In  striking  contrast  we  find  the  Biblical  writer  par- 
ticularly stating  that  the  place  of  Abraham's  encamp- 
ment was  a  nwuntain  east  of  Bethel,^ — a  situation  from 
which,  as  travellers  have  pointed  out,^  Lot  could  have 

*  The  original  is  "  vom  judiiischen  Ufer  aus  aufsteigen  sah. " — Geschichte, 
1878,  p.  329. 

2  Gen.  xix.  27. 

'  Biblical  Researches,  second  edition,  vol.  ii,  pp.  82,  85. 

■*  English  translation,  vol.  i.  p.  81.  ^  Gen.  xii.  8. 

*  Stanley,  Siuai  and  Palestine,  third  edition,  p.  217  f. 


100  Tlie  "Earlier  Prophets." 

obtained  that  view  of  the  fertile  Jordan  valley  which 
determined  his  choice.^  And  once  more,  as  an  instance 
how  in  statements  of  topography  one  will  readily  make 
a  slip  in  matters  with  which  he  is  well  acquainted,  a 
recent  critical  writer  tells  us  that  Elijah,  on  the  memor- 
able occasion  of  his  sacrifice  on  Mount  Carmel,  *'  hurried 
the  priests  of  Baal  down  to  the  brook  Jabbok,  and  slew 
them  there,"  ^ — a  much  more  "  considerable  mistake  "  than 
that  which  Wellhausen  thinks  he  finds  in  the  Biblical 
writer's  account  of  Elijah's  movements.^ 

As  an  example,  on  the  other  hand,  of  the  very  minute 
accuracy  of  the  Biblical  narratives  in  this  respect,  we  may 
take  the  account  of  Elijah's  sacrifice  on  Mount  Carmel.* 
The  scene  of  the  narrative,  which  had  been  little  visited 
by  travellers,  was  found  on  the  eastern  extremity  of  Car- 
mel, overlooking  the  great  plain  of  Esdraelon,  and  was 
known  to  the  natives  by  the  name  El-Muhrakaliy  The 
Burnt  (or  the  place  of  burning) ;  and  all  who  have  visited 
it,  and  compared  it  with  the  account  given  of  the  events 
of  that  memorable  day,  testify  to  the  correspondence  in 
minutest  details  between  the  narrative  and  the  locality.^ 
Now  all  this  goes  to  show  that  there  is  more  in  these 
stories  than  what  Wellhausen  calls  "  a  local  colour  which 
bespeaks  a  local  origin."  ^  Much  less  can  we  admit  what 
he  asserts  in  regard  to  the  patriarchal  stories,  that  their 
significance  is  "entirely  bound  up  with  the  locality,"^ 
and  that  "  for  the  most  part  we  have  the  product  of  a 
countless  number  of  narrators,  unconsciously  modifying 

^  Gen.  xiii.  10.  -  Allan  Menzies,  Natural  Religion,  p.  135. 

'  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  292,  note.  ■*  1  Kings  xviii. 

^  A  graphic  account  is  given  by  Van  de  Velde,  vol.  i.  p.  320  ff. ,  with 
which  may  be  compared  Stanley,  Sinai  and  Palestine,  third  edition,  p. 
353. 

«  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  327,  ^  Ibid.,  p.  325. 


Argument  f7vm  To;pography.  101 

each  other's  work."^  The  ordinary  reader  will  find  it 
very  hard  to  believe  that  in  "  the  manifold  variants  and 
repetitions  of  the  same  stories "  this  feature  of  minutely 
accurate  local  picturing  could  have  been  preserved.  And 
when  we  take  into  account  that  not  only  in  the  stories  of 
the  patriarchs,  but  everywhere  in  the  historical  books,  this 
accuracy  is  maintained,  and  bear  in  mind  the  liability  to 
error  which  is  inherent  in  oral  transmission,  we  have  a 
problem  to  solve  which  cannot  bo  brushed  aside  by  these 
ohiter  dicta  of  Wellhausen.  If  these  stories  could  not 
have  maintained  their  topographical  accuracy  in  oral 
tradition,  then  they  were  written  by  men  who  knew  the 
localities  and  had  them  before  their  eye ;  and  if  the  stories 
have  not  foundation  in  fact,  then  the  writer — and  be  it 
remembered  this  is  one  of  the  admitted  earliest  class  of 
writings — was  not  merely  a  spinner  or  retailer  of  myths, 
but  he  was  a  most  accomplished  writer  of  romance.  A 
recent  French  writer,  who  has  made  in  all  seriousness  a 
reductio  ad  absurduiii  of  criticism  by  denying  almost  en- 
tirely the  pre-exilian  existence  of  literature  in  Israel,^  has 
the  courage  of  his  theory  here,  and  it  is  interesting  to 
observe  how  he  accounts  for  this  striking  accuracy  of 
topographical  details.  He  fancies  a  company  of  theolo- 
gians at  the  time  of  the  restoration  sitting  down  to  see 

1  Hisfc.  of  Israel,  p.  327. 

2  Maurice  Vernes,  Les  Resultats  de  I'Exegese  Biblique,  p.  50.  If  refuta- 
tion is  necessary  of  such  a  view,  it  is  found  in  the  fact  that  the  names  of 
Bible  places  have  been  in  most  cases  recovered  from  the  mouths  of  the 
peasantry— a  proof  that  the  story  has  clung  to  the  site  from  most  ancient 
time.  Were  Vernes's  view  correct,  we  should  have  had  a  number  of  sites 
such  as  the  Crusaders  and  monks  determined  hy  the  hook,  whereas  we 
have  these  ancient  names,  often  unintelligible  to  the  natives,  and  un- 
associated,  to  their  knowledge,  with  any  ancient  event.  And  this  aspect 
of  British  reseai-ch  should  be  fairly  faced  in  critical  reconstructions  of 
history  and  books. 


102  The  ''Earlier  Proplietsr 

who  would  give  the  most  highly  coloured  account  of  early 
times ;  and  the  one,  for  example,  who  by  report  at  least 
knew  most  of  Egypt,  would  take  in  hand  the  story  of  the 
exodus,  and  so  on.  He  does  not  tell  us  how  many  men, 
each  with  special  knowledge  of  a  locality,  were  engaged  in 
this  work ;  but  such  a  fancy,  by  its  exaggeration,  gives  us 
some  idea  of  the  care  that  must  have  been  bestowed  on 
small  details  in  the  writing  of  these  Old  Testament  stories 
— a  care  far  above  what  we  would  expect  in  the  case  of 
plastic  material  modified  by  hundreds  of  reciters,  and 
touched  and  retouched  till  the  time  of  the  captivity  and 
after  it.^  Whatever  we  may  say  about  them,  this  char- 
acteristic of  these  narratives  must  raise  our  estimate  of 
the  literary  care  and  ability  of  these  writers ;  and  if  we 
find  them  so  careful  in  this  class  of  details,  we  may  be 
prepared  to  give  more  heed  to  them  when  they  give  us 
particulars  of  another  kind. 

No  doubt  this  minute  topographical  accuracy  does  not 
in  itself  vouch  for  the  historical  truth  of  the  narratives, 
and  to  some  extent  there  is  reason  for  the  reproach  of  a 
Continental  writer ^  that  "English  Palestine  research,  by 
its  apologetic  tendency,  runs  the  risk  of  failing  to  secure 
recognition  as  a  complete  international  science."  German 
scholars,  he  says,  while  quite  as  well  aware  as  the  English 
investigators  of  the  close  connection  of  this  specialty  with 
the  scientific  interpretation  of  the  Bible,  "  have  at  the 
same  time  the  historical,  critical,  and  philological  prepara- 
tion which  is  necessary  to  successful  labour."  In  their 
view,  it  is  "  an  essential  point  that  Palestine  research  re- 
main in  the  closest  contact  with  these  other  branches  of 
study,"  and  that "  a  scholar  who  writes  on  the  geography 

^  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  294. 

2  Socin,  in  the  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  ii.  p.  241  ff. 


Socin  and  Palestine  Exploration.  103 

of  Palestine,  shall  first  have  made  himself  thoroughly 
familiar  with  the  problems  and  results  of  Old  Testament 
criticism,"  for  "  only  there  can  he  form  a  judgment  con- 
cerning the  real  history  of  Israel."  All  very  good ;  but  it 
may  be  contended  as  strenuously,  on  the  other  hand,  that 
the  said  German  scholars  should,  in  estimating  the  literary 
products  of  Israel,  take  into  account  this  feature  of  them 
to  which  we  call  attention,  and  not  merely  dismiss  them 
with  the  remark  that  they  have  a  strong  local  colouring. 
Perhaps  if  German  scholars  had  gone  more  out  into  the 
broad  light  of  day,  and  looked  at  these  narratives  in 
connection  with  the  places  to  which  they  relate,  instead 
of  keeping  their  science,  to  use  Socin's  own  words,  "  under 
ground,  in  the  esoteric  circle  of  special  students,"  they 
would  have  attained  results  more  acceptable  to  average 
common-sense.  No  doubt,  strictly  speaking,  the  identifi- 
cation of  the  place  does  not  prove  the  historic  truth  of 
the  event  associated  with  it.  It  is,  it  may  be  admitted, 
"unjustifiable  to  assume  without  further  investigation 
that  the  list  of  stations  in  the  wandering  in  the  wilder- 
ness is  the  work  of  Moses  ; "  ^  nay,  we  are  not,  strictly 
speaking,  entitled  to  assume  that  the  Israelites  ever 
travelled  that  way  at  all.  The  list  may  be  a  mere  feat 
of  archaeological  research,  drawn  up  by  those  who  knew 
the  ordinary  route  through  these  parts.  Neither  does 
the  topography  of  Mount  Carmel,  which  suits  the  story 
of  Elijah  as  exactly  as  if  it  was  written  on  the  spot, 
prove  even  that  Elijah  ever  existed;  and  Dean  Stanley 
was  not  strictly  correct  when  he  asserted ^  that  "the 
wells  of  Beersheba  in  the  wide  frontier-valley  of  Pales- 
tine are  indisputable  witnesses  of  the  life  of  Abraham." 

^  Socin,  I.  c.     Compare  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  350. 
*  Sinai  and  Palestine,  p.  148. 


104  The  ''Earlier  Prophets:' 

But  neither  was  Carlyle  justified  in  assuming  from  the 
ruins  of  St  Edmundsbury  that  St  Edmund  ever  existed ; 
nor  do  the  stones  stuck  here  and  there  in  the  plain  of 
Leipzig,  telling  where  so  many  thousands  of  men  had 
their  position  under  certain  commanders,  prove  that  a 
great  battle  was  ever  fought  there.  Let  us  criticise  our 
authorities  by  all  means.  But  let  us  not  turn  away  from 
such  firm  palpable  aids  to  criticism  as  we  possess,  to 
"  underground "  canons  which  only  esoteric  students 
can  comprehend.  It  will  occur  to  many,  that  if  it  is 
unjustifiable  to  construct  a  map  of  Palestine  showing  the 
tribal  divisions,  a  good  many  other  maps  will  have  to 
be  accepted  with  reserve.  The  ordinary  reader  who 
believes,  with  Thomas  Carlyle,  that  "  man  has  ever  been, 
in  spite  of  wide -spread  calumnies  to  the  contrary,  a 
veracious  creature,"  will  be  anxious  to  know  why  it  is 
that  so  much  criticism  is  necessary  in  regard  to  matters 
of  Biblical  history  such  as  are  accepted  without  ques- 
tion in  other  fields.  Wellhausen's  off-hand  remark  about 
"  plastic  and  living  materials  "  and  stories  whose  signifi- 
cance was  "  entirely  bound  up  with  the  locality,"  is  quite 
insufficient  to  explain  the  fact  that  this  minute  accuracy 
is  not  confined  to  one  set  of  stories  nor  to  one  locality. 
The  point  of  the  story  so  often  turns  upon  the  local 
situation,  and  stories  so  constructed  in  one  locality  fit 
in  so  exactly  to  others  constructed  for  other  localities, 
as  in  Abraham's  sojourns  at  different  spots,  making  a 
connected  history,  that  this  explanation  is  altogether  too 
superficial.  Instead  of  the  materials  being  so  plastic  as 
he  supposes  in  the  ninth  and  eighth  centuries,  it  is  evi- 
dent that  the  writers  of  these  narratives  were  handlin<:r 
no  shadowy  myth,  but  writing  of  men  who  were  as  real 
to  them  as  men  of  their  own  age.    We  are,  in  short,  in  these 


Priestly  Literary  Activity.  105 

narratives,  not  at  the  stage  of  floating  vague  tradition, 
but  at  a  time  at  which  men  wrote  with  care  about  persons 
and  events  that  they  considered  historical.  What  more 
is  implied  in  this  fact  we  shall  consider  more  fully  in 
the  next  chapter. 

In  our  endeavour  to  estimate  the  amount  of  literary 
and  educational  activity  in  ancient  Israel,  we  must  not 
overlook  the  work  of  the  priests,  who  were  at  least  as 
early  and  as  well  marked  a  class  as  the  prophets.  Al- 
though a  great  part  of  the  admitted  literature  is  of  a 
popular  or  prophetic  character,  yet  Wellhausen  has  told 
us  (above,  p.  61)  that  at  an  early  period  "  certain  collec- 
tions of  laws  and  decisions  of  the  priests"  were  also 
committed  to  writing.  The  "  legal  documents  "  also,  and 
"  family  reminiscences,"  which  furnished  materials  for  the 
first  historiography,  were  most  probably,  as  in  other 
countries,  under  priestly  custody ;  and  Stade  says  ^  that  it 
was  under  priestly  influence  that  the  patriarchal  legends 
assumed  their  peculiar  form.  All  this  implies  a  consid- 
erable degree  of  literary  activity ;  and  the  preservation  of 
legal  and  family  documents  presupposes  such  activity  in 
a  still  earlier  time.  Though  their  literary  labours  may 
have  been  chiefly  technical,  and  restricted  to  a  somewhat 
professional  circle,  yet  in  their  work  as  popular  educators 
the  priests  must  take  rank  with  the  prophets.  The  bear- 
ing of  this  on  the  more  outward  features  of  the  religion 
will  be  seen  in  the  sequel.^ 

^  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  145.  ^  See  particularly  cliap.  xv.  p.  391. 


106 


CHAPTER    V. 

TESTIMONY   OF  THE   NINTH  AND   EIGHTH   CENTURIES 
TO  THE  ANTECEDENT   HISTORY. 

Following  up  the  conclusions  of  preceding  chapters,  the  inquiry  is  raised 
whether  it  is  possible,  from  the  admitted  writings,  to  determine  the 
outstanding  facts  of  the  previous  history — Not  a  question  of  the  order 
of  composition  of  books,  or  of  origin  of  observances,  but  an  appeal  to 
the  consciousness  of  the  nation — Amos  and  Hosea  are  found  to  hold 
essentially,  for  the  period  succeeding  Moses,  the  same  scheme  of  history 
which  is  by  modern  critics  pronounced  to  be  late  and  unhistorical — Their 
testimony  confirmed  by  the  song  of  Deborah — In  regard  to  patriarchal 
history,  the  intimations  of  the  prophets,  so  far  as  they  go,  are  in  accord 
with  the  Pentateuch —  Wellhausen's  dictum  in  regard  to  the  patriarchal 
stories  examined  ;  an  illustration  of  his  method  of  interpretation — His 
explanation  of  the  genealogical  system:  its  failure  to  account  for 
Abraham — His  canon  at  fault  in  regard  to  "outward  features" — 
Peculiarities  distinguishing  patriarchal  stories  from  Gentile  legends — 
Nebular  hypothesis  of  early  histoid — Conclusion :  that  the  eighth  centwy 
is  a  time  of  broad  historic  day,  when  Israel  had  a  definite  account  to 
give  of  itself  and  of  its  early  history. 

In  the  preceding  chapters  it  has  been  argued  that  the 
admitted  writings  of  the  so-called  earliest  literary  age 
imply  a  time  of  antecedent  preparation  and  training  of 
both  a  literary  and  a  religious  kind.  We  have  also  seen 
that  the  earliest  writing  prophets  appeal  to  prophetic 
men  of  kindred  spirit  before  them,  and  we  have  endeav- 
oured to  show  that  there  is  evidence  of  such  a  prophetic 


Attempt  to  reach  actual  Events^  107 

line  from  Samuel  downwards,  capable  of  giving  to  the 
history  the  peculiar  cast  in  which  it  appears  in  the  his- 
torical books.  One  feature  of  these  books,  the  minute 
accuracy  in  topographical  detail,  has  led  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  writers  of  history  in  the  so-called  earliest  literary 
period,  unless  they  are  to  be  regarded  as  clever  romancers, 
wrote  down  what  to  them  was  not  vague,  plastic  myth, 
but  actual  history.  And  it  is  claimed  that  this  minute 
correspondence  of  locality  with  narrative  is  inconsistent 
with  the  account  given  by  critical  writers  of  the  origin 
of  these  narratives  and  the  trustworthiness  of  the  writers. 

Let  us  now  go  a  step  further  and  open  up  a  new  line 
of  inquiry :  Is  it  possible  from  the  writings  to  which  we 
have  restricted  ourselves  to  draw  any  conclusions  with 
regard  to  the  outstanding  events  of  the  antecedent  history? 
We  have  precluded  ourselves  from  accepting  the  books 
composing  the  Pentateuch  as  evidence  regarding  the 
period  to  which  they  relate.  But  it  may  be  possible,  from 
the  books  which  we  are  allowed  to  use,  to  derive  such 
indications  as  will  either  confirm  the  books  which  are 
reserved  or  show  in  what  manner  their  unhistorical  state- 
ments (as  they  are  called)  arose.  That  we  need  not 
expect  to  find  in  the  prophetic  writnigs  anything  like  a 
full  account  of  the  history  is  evident  from  the  very  nature 
of  the  compositions,  to  say  nothing  of  their  very  limited 
bulk.  But  by  a  comparison  of  these  with  one  another  and 
with  other  books,  we  may  be  able  to  draw  a  parallel  or  a 
contrast  between  the  modes  in  which  the  history  of  the 
time  to  which  we  refer  was  regarded  by  the  respective 
writers,  and  reach  whatever  conclusions  we  can  as  to  the 
actual  facts. 

As  to  the  method  of  this  inquiry,  it  is  to  be  remarked 
that  what  we  seek  primarily  to  determine  is  neither  the 


108  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Cefbturies, 

order  of  composition  of  books  nor  the  history  of  religions 
observances.  The  method  usually  followed  by  apologists 
is  to  show  by  "  references  "  or  "  quotations  "  that  the  books 
of  the  Pentateuch,  for  example,  are  older  than  the  pro- 
phetic writings.  It  is  obvious,  however,  that  the  argu- 
ment from  references  and  quotations  may  be  turned  the 
other  way ;  and  this  mode  of  reasoning  becomes  very  pre- 
carious and  unsatisfactory,  since  questions  of  integrity  and 
genuineness  in  the  books  supposed  to  be  referred  to  are 
sure  to  arise.  On  the  other  hand,  the  method  pursued 
generally  by  critical  writers  of  tracing  the  history  of  the 
religion  by  the  aid  of  outward  rites  and  observances  is 
liable  to  similar  and  other  equally  strong  objections,  which 
will  be  stated  farther  on.^  Our  point  is,  that  in  tlie 
writings  of  contemporaneous  prophets,  and  admitted  pro- 
ductions of  the  same  age,  we  get  upon  firm  ground.  The 
slightest  glance  at  the  prophetical  literature  will  show 
that  the  history  turned  upon  something  very  different 
from  written  books  or  outward  observances.  By  the 
time,  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets  it  is  evident  that 
certain  fundamental  religious  conceptions  are  firmly 
grasped — a  certain  view  is  entertained  of  the  antecedent 
course  of  religious  history  ;  for  proof  of  which  appeal  is 
made  not  to  written  books  or  outward  observances,  but 
to  the  general  consciousness  of  the  nation.  If  we  can 
penetrate  to  the  origin  of  these,  we  shall  come  at  a  know- 
ledge of  the  nation's  religious  life  and  history  in  a  much 
more  effectual  way  than  by  settling  the  order  in  which 
books  were  written  and  le2:al  codes  came  into  existence; 
and  it  will  perhaps  be  found  that,  standing  on  such  firm 
ground,  we  shall  be  in  a  better  position  to  pronounce 
judgment  on  those  other  questions  of  books  and  institu- 

^  See  chap.  xiii.  p.  328. 


Testimony  of  Amos  and  Hosca.  109 

tions.  What  we  propose,  therefore,  to  do  in  the  present 
chapter,  is  to  inquire  what  views  prevailed,  in  the  period 
to  which  we  have  restricted  ourselves,  in  regard  to  the 
antecedent  religious  history,  and  what  inferences  may 
safely  be  drawn  as  to  the  actual  facts. 

Confining  ourselves  at  the  outset  to  Amos  and  Hosea, 
we  take  it  to  be  quite  clear  that  by  their  time  a  certain 
outline  (and  from  the  limited  materials  and  nature  of  the 
books  we  cannot  expect  more)  of  the  past  history  of  the 
nation,  was  firmly  fixed  and  held  undisputed  in  the  national 
mind.  Particular  stress  must  be  laid  on  the  fact  that  it 
is  not  the  individual  testimony  of  two  men  that  we  have 
on  this  point,  but  the  testimony  of  the  generation  they  ad- 
dressed. All  the  proof  Amos  advances,  when  he  refers  to 
past  history,  is  the  appeal  to  the  knowledge  of  his  hearers, 
"Is  it  not  so,  0  house  of  Israel?"  (Amos  ii.  11.)  And 
the  testimony  is  all  the  stronger  here  because  the  people 
are  unwilling  witnesses,  the  prophet's  references  to  the 
past  being  made  not  for  the  purpose  of  flattering  national 
vanity,  but  of  rebuking  national  backsliding.  The  argu- 
ment used  here  is  one  which  critical  writers  can  employ 
with  effect  when  occasion  requires.  Daumer,^  for  ex- 
ample, argues  from  the  statement  of  Amos  regarding 
worship  in  the  wilderness  (Amos  v.  26  ff.),  not  merely 
that  it  was  a  fact  that  Israel  for  forty  years  worshipped 
not  Jahaveli  but  Moloch,  but  also  that  this  was  a  well- 
known  and  undisputed  fact  in  the  prophet's  days. 

Attention  may  be  drawn,  at  the  outset,  to  the  manner  in 
which  these  two  men  address  tlieir  generation  and  speak 
of  their  nation.  "  Israel "  stands  not  only  for  the  northern 
kingdom,  but  for  the  combined  people.  And  when  one 
message  is  given  to  the  whole  under  one  name,  and  when 

^  Feuer  und  Moloch -dienst  der  Alten  Hebriier,  p.  49.     So  others. 


110         Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

Hosea  has  reached  the  stage  of  personifying  Israel  as  a 
dearly  loved  but  faithless  wife,  or  as  a  first-boin  son,  it  is 
evident  that  we  are  far  beyond  the  stage — if  ever  there 
was  such  a  stage — when  the  nation  grew  into  one  from 
merely  contiguous  or  even  related  tribes.  If  Hosea  is  to 
be  believed,  Israel  was  one  people  from  the  time  of  the 
exodus.  But  to  pass  from  this,  let  us  note  certain  definite 
points  in  the  scheme  of  history  held  by  these  men. 

The  first  point  to  be  noticed  is,  that  Amos  and  Hosea 
agree  in  going  back  to  the  deliverance  from  Egypt  and 
the  guidance  through  the  desert  as  not  only  well-attested 
and  undisputed  facts,  but  as  also  events  of  the  deepest 
religious  import.  Thus  Amos  utters  the  word  of  Jaha- 
veh  "  against  the  whole  family  which  I  brought  up  from 
the  land  of  Egypt,  saying,  You  only  have  I  known  of  all 
the  families  of  the  earth  "  (Amos  iii.  1,  2) ;  and  speaking 
of  the  great  things  God  had  done  for  them  in  the  past,  he 
says :  "  Yet  destroyed  I  the  Amorite  before  them,  whose 
height  was  as  the  height  of  the  cedars,  and  he  was  strong 
as  the  oaks ;  yet  I  destroyed  his  fruit  from  above,  and  his 
roots  from  beneath.  Also  I  brought  you  up  out  of  tlie 
land  of  Egypt,  and  led  you  forty  years  in  the  wilderness, 
to  possess  the  land  of  the  Amorite"  (Amos  ii.  9-11). 
Similarly  Hosea  refers  to  the  days  of  the  youth  of  the 
nation — "  the  day  when  she  came  up  out  of  the  land  of 
Egypt "  (Hos.  ii.  15).  "  When  Israel  was  a  child,  then  I 
loved  him,  and  called  my  son  out  of  Egypt "  (xi.  1).  Twice 
he  uses  the  words,  "  I  am  Jahaveh  thy  God  from  the  land 
of  Egypt "  (xii.  9,  xiii.  4),  basing  upon  this  fact  the  claim 
of  their  God  to  undivided  allegiance :  "  Thou  shalt  know 
no  god  but  me,  and  beside  me  there  is  no  faviour " 
(xiii.  4).  And  to  denote  the  tender  care  with  which  they 
were  watched  in  the  desert,  he  says :  "  I  found  Israel  like 


The  Exodus — The  House  of  David,  111 

grapes  in  the  wilderness  ;  I  saw  your  fathers  as  the  first- 
ripe  in  the  fig-tree  at  her  first  season  "  (ix.  10).  "  I  did 
know  thee  in  the  wilderness,  in  the  land  of  great  drought " 
(xiii.  5).  Here  there  is  one  clear  line,  boldly  drawn — one 
great  epocli  in  the  history  vouched  for  by  the  strongest 
testimony  we  can  in  the  circumstances  expect.  These 
two  prophets — men  of  very  different  temperaments,  who 
have  very  different  attitudes  to  the  people  of  their  time — 
take  it  as  a  thing  not  gainsaid,  that  from  the  exodus 
Israel  had  been  distinguished  by  special  religious  privilege 
manifested  in  a  remarkable  history.  The  way  in  which 
they  refer  to  th.ese  events — in  general  terms,  no  doubt, 
but  with  a  hortatory  and  didactic  purpose — leaves  no 
room  for  doubt  that  the  belief  was  already  ingrained  in 
the  nation  that,  to  use  the  current  phrase,  they  were  a 
chosen  race.  The  divine  choice  had  been  signally  ex- 
hibited in  the  events  of  the  exodus  and  the  conquest  of 
Canaan ;  and  that  these  events  were  not  regarded  as 
isolated  or  accidental  occurrences,  is  proved  by  the  in- 
sistance  on  the  continual  guidance  and  instruction  which 
had  been  communicated  through  "prophets,"  and  the 
bestowal  of  other  privileges  which  are  always  being 
brought  to  remembrance. 

A  second  significant  point,  very  observable  in  the  writ- 
ings of  these  two  prophets,  is  the  pre-eminence  assigned 
by  both  of  them  to  the  southern  kingdom,  and  the  special 
importance  of  the  house  of  David.  Amos  comes  all  the 
way  from  the  south  of  Judah  to  testify  against  the 
northern  kingdom,  and  his  very  first  words  are :  "  Jaha- 
veh  shall  roar  from  Zion,  and  utter  His  voice  from  Jer- 
usalem "  (Amos  i.  2).  Even  the  sins  for  which  Judah  is 
reproved  give  a  hint  of  special  religious  privilege  "  Be- 
cause they  have  rejected  the  law  of  Jahaveh,  and  have 


1 1'2         TesUmony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries, 

not  kept  His  statutes  "  (ii.  4).  And  then  his  anticipation  of 
coming  blessing  is  expressed  in  the  words :  "  I  will  raise 
up  the  tabernacle  of  David  that  is  fallen,  and  close  up  the 
breaches  thereof;  and  I  will  raise  up  his  ruins,  and  I  will 
build  it  as  in  the  days  of  old"  (ix.  11).  All  this,  it  will 
be  remembered,  though  spoken  by  a  native  of  the  south, 
comes  from  a  prophet  whose  mission  was  to  the  northern 
kingdom.  And  even  more  striking  are  the  references  of 
Hosea,  a  native  of  the  northern  kingdom  itself.  Having 
at  the  outset  of  his  prophecy  said,  "  I  will  no  more  have 
mercy  upon  the  house  of  Israel  that  I  should  in  any  wise 
pardon  them,"  he  immediately  adds,  "  But  I  will  have 
mercy  upon  the  house  of  Judah,  and  will  save  them  by 
Jahaveh  their  God "  (Hos.  i.  6,  7).^  So  again,  "  Though 
thou,  Israel,  play  the  harlot,  yet  let  not  Judah  offend" 
(iv.  15) ;  and  finally,  though  Judah  is  classed  with 
Ephraim  in  many  places,  yet  the  prophet's  anticipation  is 
again  like  tliat  of  Amos.  He  speaks  of  the  reunion  of 
the  two  kingdoms  (i.  11),  and  describes  it  in  these  terms: 
"  Afterward  shall  the  children  of  Israel  return,  and  seek 
Jahaveh  their  God,  and  David  their  king;  and  shall  fear 
Jahaveh  and  His  goodness  in  the  latter  days"  (iii.  5). 
This,  then,  is  an  additional  point  gained,  that  even  in  the 
northern  kingdom,  if  the  testimony  of  Hosea  and  his  con- 
temporaries is  of  any  value,  the  pre-eminence  in  religious 
standing  of  the  southern  kingdom  was  acknowledged,  and 
the  divine  promise  of  a  "sure  house"  to  David ^  was 
accepted  by  the  nation  generally  as  a  substantial  fact. 


^  Hos.  xi.  12  is  doubtful :  "  Epliraim  compasseth  me  about  with  lies, 
and  the  bouse  of  Israel  with  deceit;  but  Judah  yet  ruleth  with  God,  and 
is  faithful  with  the  saints."     Others  render,  "  And  Judah  is  yet  defiant 
towards  Cod,  and  towards  the  All-Holy  One,  who  is  faithful." 
■.    '  See  2  Sam.  vii.  16,  xxiii.  5. 


IsraeTs  Apostasy.  113 

Thirdly,  While,  however,  the  prophets  thus  represented 
their  God  as  having  chosen  and  guided  Israel  from  the 
days  of  Egypt,  and  bestowed  on  the  nation  special  privi- 
leges, there  is  to  t]\em  another  aspect  of  the  history.  For 
they  as  persistently  maintain  that  Israel,  from  the  earhest 
times,  had  proved  unfaithful  to  their  God,  and  fallen  into 
the  deepest  sins.  Amos,  in  the  survey  which  he  makes, 
in  chapters  i.  and  ii.  of  his  book,  of  the  nations  for  whose 
redoubled  iniquities  the  sentence  of  divine  punishment 
would  not  be  turned  away,  does  not  except  the  two  king- 
doms of  the  cliildren  of  Israel,  and  singles  out  the  par- 
ticular sins  for  which  they  would  respectively  be  chas- 
tised. Indeed  the  whole  burden  of  his  prophecy  is  just 
this,  that  though  God  had  raised  up  of  their  sous  for 
prophets,  and  of  their  young  men  for  Nazirites  (ii.  11),^ 
though  He  had  from  time  to  time  made  known  what  He 
was  to  do  through  His  prophets  (iii.  7),  though  He  had 
known  Israel  alone  of  all  the  families  of  the  earth  (iii.  2), 
yet  doom  was  impending  over  both  kingdoms  for  their 
unfaithfulness;  and,  just  because  of  their  special  privi- 
leges, they  would  be  the  more  severely  dealt  with.  Still 
more  impressively  is  the  same  truth  taught  by  Hosea. 
Under  the  figures  of  the  dearest  earthly  relationships,  he 
represents  Israel  now  as  the  wife  of  Jahaveh  who  has 
been  unfaithful  to  her  husband  (i.  2,  &c.),  and  again  as 
a  tenderly  reared  son  who  was  bent  to  backsliding  (xi. 
7),  though  the  divine  love  still  yearned  over  them  (iii.  1, 
xi.  8  ff.,  &c.)     "  By  a  prophet  Jahaveh  brought  Israel  out 

^  "The  Nazirites  were  a  class  dating  very  far  back  ;  we  find  illustrious 
examples  of  them  in  Samson  and  Samuel  in  the  time  of  the  Judges,  and 
no  doubt  there  were  prophets  contemporary  with  them,  though,  with  the 
exception  of  the  prophetess  Deborah,  they  are  only  incidentally  men- 
tioned (Judges  vi.  8)  till  the  time  of  Samuel."— A.  B.  Davidson  in  Ex- 
positor, third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  39. 

II 


114  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

of  Egypt,  and  by  a  prophet  was  he  preserved"  (xii.  13; 
cf.  Micah  vi.  4).  God  had  "spoken  unto  the  prophets, 
and  multiplied  visions,  and  by  the  ministry  of  the  prophets 
had  used  similitudes  "  (xii.  10) ;  yea,  they  had  been  "  hewn 
by  the  prophets"  (vi.  6)  for  their  stubbornness  and  in- 
iquity; yet  they  had  "transgressed  the  covenant"  (vi. 
7),  had  "wandered  from"  their  God  (vii.  13),  "trans- 
gressed His  covenant,  and  trespassed  against  His  law " 
(viii.  1).  For  their  iniquities,  which  are  specified  over 
and  over  again,  and  set  in  new  lights  to  make  them 
more  odious,  they  are  told  tliat  "the  days  of  visitation 
jare  come,  the  days  of  recompense  are  come  "  (ix.  *7) ;  that 
"the  iniquity  of  Ephraim  is  bound  up,  his  sin  laid  up  in 
store"  (xiii.  12);  and  not  even  the  grave  will  be  able  to 
cover  him  from  the  divine  judgment  (xiii.  14).  Com- 
pare Amos  ix.  2-4. 

'^Mt,  fourthly,  the  prophetic  voice  has  still  another  tone, 
which  is  continually  heard  in  the  midst  of  these  denun- 
ciations and  threatenings.  Both  these  prophets,  address- 
ing the  people  of  the  northern  kingdom,  declare,  as  we 
have  seen,  that  the  southern  kingdom  of  Judah,  though 
also  apostate  and  doomed  to  punishment  (Amos  ii.  4),  has 
not  so  far  fallen  from  original  fidelity ;  so  it  will  be  more 
mercifully  dealt  with  (Hosea  i.  7),  and  will  form  tlie 
rally ing-point  for  a  reunited  nationality  based  on  better 
principles  (Amos  ix.  11;  Hosea  i.  11).  Througli  the 
severest  denunciations  shines  ever  a  gleam  of  ho]ie,  based 
on  the  faithfulness  and  love  of  Jahaveh  Himself :  "  How 
shall  I  give  thee  up,  Ephraim  ?  how  shall  I  deliver  thee, 
Israel  ?  how  shall  I  make  thee  as  Adniah  ?  how  shall  I 
set  thee  as  Zeboim  ?  Mine  heart  is  turned  witliin  me, 
my  compassions  are  kindled  together.  I  will  not  execute 
the  fierceness  of  mine  anger,  I  will  not  return  to  destroy 


Prophetic  Philosophy  of  History.  115 

Epiiraim :  for  I  am  God,  and  not  man ;  the  Holy  One  in 
the  midst  of  thee"  (Hosea  xi.  8,  9). 

Now  all  this  agrees  most  strikingly  with  what  we  have 
called  the  Biblical  theory  of  the  history.^  There  is  the 
insisting  npon  a  special  manifestation  of  favour  to  Israel 
at  the  first,  in  the  deliverance  from  Egypt  and  guidance 
through  the  desert;  there  is  the  emphasis  laid  on  the 
succession  of  teachers  divinely  appointed,  and  of  laws 
and  statutes  for  the  people's  instruction  and  guidance. 
There  is  the  promise  of  the  perpetuity  of  the  house  of 
David  as  the  basis  of  the  restoration  of  national  unity. 
There  is,  on  the  other  hand,  with  equal  emphasis,  the 
assertion  of  the  fact  that  Israel  had  been  unfaithful  to  the 
nation's  God,  and  unworthy  of  the  privileges  bestowed. 
And  further,  there  is  the  threatening  of  punishment 
for  this  unfaithfulness,  reiterated  in  various  forms  and 
couched  in  the  sternest  tones.  And  finally,  there  is  the 
assurance  that  there  will  not  be  an  end  of  the  people, 
but  that  out  of  the  overthrow  and  ruin  there  will  arise  a 
revived  and  purified  nation,  united  under  one  king,  obedi- 
ent to  their  one  God.  We  have  in  fact  here,  as  early  as 
we  are  allowed  by  the  limitations  wx  have  imposed  upon 
ourselves,  the  prophetic  philosophy  of  history  which  is  the 
guiding  principle  of  the  prophets  to  the  end.  Favour 
shown,  sin  abounding,  punishment  descending,  a  rem- 
nant saved, — this  will  be  found  to  be  the  scheme  taught 
by  all  the  prophets ;  the  scheme  on  which  they  explain 
their  whole  history.  The  teaching  as  to  the  remnant, 
so  characteristic  of  the  great  prophets,  comes  out  quite 
incidentally  in  Amos,  and  is  all  the  more  striking  on 
that  account.  Thus :  "  The  city  that  used  to  go  out  (to 
>var)  a  thousand  (strong)  shall  have  a  remnant  of  a  hun- 

^  Sec  chapter  ii.  p.  28  flf. 


11(5  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  EiglUh  Centuries, 

drcd"  (Amos  v.  3;  see  R.  Y.)  So  also,  "It  may  be  that 
the  Lord  of  hosts  will  be  gracious  unto  the  remnant  of 
Joseph"  (v.  15).  The  early  existence  of  a  succession  of 
prophets  is  an  illustration  of  the  same  principle.  That 
they  existed  is  a  proof  of  the  fact:  the  appeal  to  the 
fact  shows  that  the  theory  of  the  history  was  formed. 
It  is  this  aspect  of  the  history  which  furnislies  the  key 
to  that  persistent  expectation  of  good  in  the  latter  day 
wliich,  in  conjunction  with  the  unshaken  belief  in  the 
perpetuity  of  David's  house,  produced  the  Messianic  idea, 
increasing  ever  in  brightness  as  the  night  of  the  nation's 
history  closed  around  them.^ 

But  the  Biblical  theory  of  the  history  is  declared  by 
our  modern  historians  to  be  a  late  conception,  overlaid 
by  late  writers  upon  original  documents  which  knew  noth- 
ing of  it.  "  How  is  it/'  asks  Kuenen,^  "  that  the  picture 
of  ancient  Israel  which  we  have  thus  recovered  \i.e.,  the 
picture  which  he  thinks  criticism  warrants]  differs  so  very 
widely  from  the  current  conception  of  its  religious  con- 
dition ?  The  reason  is  not  far  to  seek.  The  current  con- 
ception is  not  derived  from  the  special  traits  of  which  I 
have  reminded  you,  but  from  the  general  reviews  of  the 
popular  religion  which  the  Israelitish  historians  lay  be- 
fore us — the  introduction  to  the  book  of  Judges  (Judges 
ii.  6,  iii.  6),  and  the  retrospect  of  the  fates  of  the  king- 
dom of  the  ten  tribes  (2  Kings  xvii.  7-23,  34-41)."  Now 
if  we  turn  to  these  reviews,  which  are  thus  set  down  as 
late,  they  are  precisely  in  the  tone  of  the  prophets  Amos 
and  Hosea,  the  very  earliest  witnesses  to  whom  we  are 
allowed  to  appeal.  What  is  the  review  of  the  period  of 
the  Judges  ?  The  children  of  Israel  did  evil  against  Ja- 
haveh,  though  He  had  manifested  special  favour  to  them ; 

*  See  Note  X.  2  National  Religions,  p.  69  f.    Comp.  above,  p.  54. 


"  Reviews  "  or  "  Summaries  "  of  the  History.        117 

He  sold  them  into  the  hand  of  this  enemy  or  that ;  they 
cried  to  Him  in  their  trouble,  He  raised  up  a  deliverer  who 
saved  them;  the  land  had  rest;  again  they  sinned ;  and 
again  the  same  cycle  was  repeated.  Tliis  summary  of  the 
period  might  have  been  written  by  Hosea  himself,  or  by 
Amos ;  and  if  there  is  any  truth  in  what  they  say  about 
prophets  before  tliem,  any  one  from  the  days  of  Samuel 
might  have  written  it.  Precisely  to  the  same  effect  is 
the  summary  of  the  history  of  the  Kings  in  all  essential 
points,  only  there  is  the  deeper  colouring  of  more  heinous 
transgression,  because  mercy  had  been  longer  prolonged, 
and  the  threatening  of  lieavier  punishment,  because  all 
means  of  reformation  had  failed. 

Now  be  it  remembered  the  modern  historians  say  that 
the  same  century  that  produced  the  writings  of  Amos  and 
Hosea  produced  also — in  an  earlier  part  of  it  perhaps — 
the  stories  contained  in  the  book  of  Judges,  but  that  these 
summaries  or  reviews  belong  to  a  late  time.  I  have 
proved  that  they  need  not  be  later  than  Amos  or  Hosea; 
in  fact,  that  they  exhibit  the  belief  current  in  this  century, 
the  very  time  in  which  the  narratives  themselves  are  said 
to  have  been  written.  In  other  words,  the  narratives  and 
the  summaries  may  be  of  the  same  date  and  may  have 
been  written  by  the  same  persons. 

I  take  it,  then,  that  the  views  of  Israel's  past  history 
given  by  the  prophets  of  the  eighth  century  were  the 
views  entertained  by  the  nation  generally  in  their  time. 
These  views,  so  far  as  they  amount  to  a  comprehensive 
conception  of  the  history  as  a  whole,  agree  exactly  with 
the  views  of  the  Hebrew  historians ;  and  so  far  as  refer- 
ence is  made  to  actual  occurrences  in  the  history,  the 
prophets  are  at  one  with  the  historians.  The  great  land- . 
marks  are  clearly  traceable :  the  deliverance  from  Egypt, 


ll^  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  CentuHes. 

the  guidance  in  the  wilderness,  the  conquest  of  Canaan, 
the  continuance  of  God -guided  men  in  the  nation,  the 
pre-eminence  of  the  house  of  David.  As  to  the  history 
subsequent  to  Moses,  we  are  already  at  a  time  when  it  is 
regarded  by  the  nation  in  that  peculiar  light  which  modern 
historians  call  late  and  unhistorical ;  and  from  the  tone 
of  the  prophets  Amos  and  Hosea,  we  may  conclude  that 
this  view  of  the  matter  was  common  and  of  old  standing. 

We  are  not,  however,  left  entirely  to  inferences  from 
the  words  of  these  prophets.  Though  at  present  restricted 
in  the  use  of  other  documents,  we  have  one  precious 
relic  in  the  song  of  Deborah,  which  even  modern  critics 
generally  allow  must  have  come  down  from  the  age  of 
the  Judges.  So  far  as  its  references  bear  upon  the 
subject  before  us,  they  agree  substantially  with  the  view 
of  the  age  we  are  considering.  At  the  time  the  song  was 
composed — the  earlier  time  when  the  tribe  of  Dan  was 
still  on  the  seaboard  (Judges  v.  17) — the  unity  of  all  the 
tribes  is  a  matter  firmly  fixed  in  the  national  conscious- 
ness. Israel  is  throughout  one  (see  verses  2,  7-9,  11), 
though  the  powerful  tribe  of  Judah  is  not  mentioned; 
and  God's  gracious  dealings  with  Israel  in  the  past,  espe- 
cially the  guidance  in  the  wilderness,  are  forcibly  referred 
to  (verses  4,  6).  One  cannot  read  this  remarkable  song 
without  coming  to  the  conclusion  that  the  rugged  and 
unformed  age  of  the  Judges,  as  we  are  accustomed  to 
regard  it,  was  animated  by  a  spirit  that  was  far  from 
being  merely  warlike  ;  and  that,  under  the  rough  exterior 
presented  to  us  in  the  stories  of  the  heroes,  there  were 
lofty  conceptions  of  God's  character  and  a  feeling  of  con- 
secration on  the  part  of  those  who  led  the  nation.  Dr 
Davidson  has  said  ^  that  "  if  we  possessed  a  few  more 

*  Expositor,  third  series,  vol,  v.  p,  54. 


The  Song  of  Deborah.  119 

utterances  of  the  prophetic  mind  in  this  age,  in  place  of 
the  external  histories  of  rude  soldiers,  we  should  probably 
be  led  to  form  a  higher  conception  even  of  the  religious 
condition  of  the  people  under  the  Judges."  But  is  it 
quantity  of  written  material  that  is  decisive  here  ?  Is  not 
this  one  example  enough  to  show  the  religious  conscious- 
ness of  the  nation  in  full  energy — enough  to  connect 
the  age  of  the  Judges  with  the  age  of  the  prophets,  and 
to  explain  the  appeal  of  the  latter  to  an  antecedent  chain 
of  prophetic  testimony  ?  For,  as  Dr  Davidson  again 
says,^  the  prophets  "  were  the  efHorescence,  season  after 
season,  of  a  tree  whose  roots  always  stood  in  the  soil;" 
and  "  we  cannot  account  for  the  appearance  of  a  succes- 
sion of  such  men  otherwise  than  on  the  supposition  that 
they  arose  out  of  a  society  in  the  main  like-minded  with 
themselves  and  fitted  to  give  them  birth."  Bruce's 
warriors  at  Bannock  burn  may  seem  a  miscellaneous  con- 
course of  half-civilised  men  fighting  in  a  rough  age 
because  they  loved  fighting ;  but  the  one  incident  of  these 
men  kneeling  to  God  before  the  battle  gives  evidence  of  a 
deeper  spirit.  So  this  song,  the  utterance  of  the  animat- 
ing spirit  of  those  times  of  struggle,  serves  to  explain  even 
the  rougher  deeds  of  men,  in  whom  the  same  spirit  was 
also  at  work  and  found  expression  in  its  own  way.  The 
song  of  Deborah  rises,  at  first  sight,  like  a  broken  arch 
amid  ruins,  pointing  we  perceive  not  whither ;  but  across  a 
gulf  of  wreck  and  confusion  another  broken  arch  rises  in 
the  prophetic  period,  in  line  with  the  former  and  pointing 
backwards.  Is  it  unreasonable  to  conclude  that  they 
form  the  remains  of  what  was  once  a  continuous  struc- 
ture ?  Have  we  not,  at  least,  seen  enough  to  convince  us 
that  it  is  arbitrary  and  unfair  to  limit  the  prophetic  age, 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  161  f. 


120         Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  CentuHcs. 

as  is  done,  to  a  period  comparatively  recent ;  and  that  the 
"  earlier  prophets"  are  substantially  in  accord  with  the 
later  in  the  account  they  give  of  their  nation's  histol-y  and 
relif^ion  ? 

Hitherto  we  have  mostly  confined  ourselves  to  the 
earliest  writing  prophets,  and  endeavoured  to  determine 
the  view  they  held  of  the  history  from  the  period  of  the 
exodus.  When  we  inquire  as  to  the  times  anterior  to 
Moses,  we  find  few  references  in  these  prophets  to  guide 
us.  Such  as  they  are,  however,  they  agree  with  the  books 
of  the  Pentateuch  which  refer  to  that  period.  When, 
for  example,  Amos  in  his  threatening  against  Edom  says 
(Amos  i.  11),  "Because  he  did  pursue  his  brother  with 
the  sword,  and  did  cast  off  all  pity,"  he  proves  that  the 
story  of  Jacob  and  Esau  was  already  current.  The 
descent  of  the  great  northern  tribes  from  Joseph  is  im- 
plied in  the  expression  "  the  affliction  of  Joseph  "  (vi.  6) ; 
and  the  mention  of  the  "  high  places  of  Isaac "  (vii.  9)  is 
another  hint  of  the  general  acquaintance  of  the  prophet's 
hearers  with  the  patriarclial  story.  So  when  Hosea  in  a 
passing  illustration  says  (Hosea  xi.  8),  "  How  shall  I  give 
thee  up,  Ephraim  ?  how  shall  I  deliver  thee,  Israel  ?  how 
shall  I  make  thee  as  Admah  ?  how  shall  I  set  thee  as 
Zeboim  ? "  he  not  merely  confirms,  so  far  as  his  word 
may  be  taken,  the  account  given  in  Genesis  of  the  destruc- 
tion of  the  cities  of  the  plain,  but  shows  that  this  tradition 
was  already  a  national  possession.  And  when  the  same 
prophet  says  (xii.  12),  "Jacob  fled  into  the  country  of 
Syria;  and  Israel  served  for  a  wife,  and  fur  a  wife  he 
kept  sheep,"  he  does  more  than  vouch  for  the  belief  in 
the  single  incidents  mentioned ;  for  these  are  inseparable 
items  in  a  connected  story,  which  is  thus  guaranteed 
as  well   known.     Nav,  the  homiletic   manner  in  which 


The  StoiHes  of  the  Patriarchs.  121 

the  incidents  are  handled  shows  that  by  this  time  the 
patriarchal  history  was  not  merely  a  string  of  popular 
folk-lore,  but  was  a  subject  of  reflection  and  edification. 
For  the  point  of  the  reference  probably  is  not  merely 
that  God  w^as  the  guardian  of  Israel  in  all  dangers,  but 
that  Jacob,  in  whom  the  northern  kingdom  boasted,  was 
but  a  poor  fugitive  shepherd  serving  for  a  wife,  whereas 
the  leader  who  brought  the  people  from  Egypt  (mentioned 
in  the  next  verse)  was  a  prophet  and  shepherd  of  the 
people.^  This,  indeed,  is  the  special  value  of  the  refer- 
ences of  the  prophets  to  the  earlier  history,  that  the  story 
is  shown  to  be  not  a  mere  legend  afterwards  worked  over 
in  a  prophetic  spirit,  but  that  it  was,  as  early  as  we  can 
reach  it,  the  groundwork  of  prophetic  teaching. 

Passing  now  from  the  prophets  to  the  patriarchal  stories 
in  the  book  of  Genesis,  what  are  we  to  say  of  the  history 
which  they  profess  to  give  ?  These  narratives,  forming 
what  is  called  the  Jehovistic  portion  of  the  book  of 
Genesis,  are,  as  has  been  already  mentioned,^  admitted  to 
belong  to  the  first  literary  age,  and  indeed  to  the  earlier 
part  of  it.  Wellhausen  in  speaking^  of  them  says:  "The 
materials  here  are  not  mythical  but  national,  and  therefore 
more  transparent,  and  in  a  certain  sense  more  historical " 
(viz.,  than  the  primeval  history  contained  in  the  earliest 
chapters  of  Genesis).  Then  he  goes  on  to  say :  "  It  is  true 
we  attain  to  no  historical  knowledge  of  the  patriarchs,  but 
only  of  tlie  time  when  the  stories  about  them  arose  in  the 
Israelite  people :  this  later  age  is  here  unconsciously  pro- 
jected, in  its  inner  and  its  outward  features,  into  hoar 
antiquity,  and  is  refiected  there  like  a  glorified  mirage." 
What  he  means  is,  that  certain  historical  events  of  "  this 

1  So  Bredenkamp,  Gesetz  und  Propheten,  p.  26. 

«  Chap.  iii.  p.  5a.  ^  Hist,  of  Israel,  pp.  318,  319. 


122  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

later  age  "  are  dressed  up  in  this  legendary  form,  or  ac- 
counted for,  or  lie  hid  in  these  stories  of  times  long 
bygone ;  and  that  it  is  the  work  of  criticism  to  find  out 
what  are  .the  national  and  "  more  historical "  facts  which 
underlie  the  legendary  accounts.  A  good  example  is 
furnished  by  him^  in  a  passage  referring  to  tlie  origin 
of  these  stories.     It  runs  as  follows: — 

"Even  the  Jeliovistic  narratives  about  the  patriarchs  belong  to  the 
lime  when  Israel  had  already  become  a  powerful  kingdom,  Moab, 
Amnion,  and  Edom  had  been  subjugated  (Gen.  xxvii.  29),  and 
vigorous  frontier  wars  were  being  carried  on  with  the  Syrians 
about  Gilead  (Gen.  xxxi.  52).  In  Gen.  xxvii.  40,  allusion  is  made 
to  the  constantly  repeated  subjugations  of  Edoni  by  Judah,  alternat- 
ing with  successful  revolts  on  the  part  of  the  former." 

Unless  the  ordinary  reader  is  prepared  submissively  to 
accept  all  that  "  scholars  tell  us,"  he  will  do  well  to  turn 
up  the  passages  here  referred  to,  and  form  his  own  judg- 
ment as  to  whether  Wellhausen  can  see  farther  into  a 
millstone  than  himself.  As  to  the  acuteness  of  the 
critical  faculty,  wliich  is  able  under  such  general  state- 
ments to  detect  the  definite  historical  events  to  which 
they  are  supposed  to  relate,  it  may  be  mentioned  that 
another  critical  writer,^  who  is  not  behind  Wellhausen 
in  confidence  in  his  own  power  to  read  true  history  out 
of  such  indications,  places  the  formation  of  the  legend  of 
the  Syrian  origin  of  the  patriarchs  not  earlier  than  the 
captivity,  when  the  Hebrews  had  friendly  relations  with 
Mesopotamia.  In  regard  to  Wellhausen's  view,  however, 
it  is  surely  an  extraordinary  freak  of  the  legend-spinner 
to  hide  his  reference  to  the  carrying  on  of  "  vigorous 
frontier  wars,"  under  the  story  of  the  setting  up  of  a  cairn 

^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  464,  footnote. 

2  Maurice  Verues,  Rdsultats  de  I'Ex^gese,  p.  46  f. 


History  in  the  Guise  of  Legend.  123 

to  perpetuate  peace.  This  whole  line  of  argument  forces 
us  to  suppose  that  these  stories  originated  after  the  events 
supposed  to  be  referred  to.  The  question  is,  Was  all 
the  residuum  of  fact  in  these  stories  such  events  as  tlie 
subjugation  of  Moab,  Ammon,  and  Edom,  and  the  border 
wars  in  Gilead  ?  Did  the  nation  know  nothing  of  Jacob 
and  his  connection  with  Mesopotamia  till  the  wars  arose 
in  Gilead,  and  had  they  no  traditional  belief  that  they 
were  to  be  a  paramount  power  till  after  Moab,  Ammon, 
and  Edom  were  subjugated  ?  And  then,  as  one  event 
after  another  in  their  history  took  place,  in  the  matter- 
of-fact  days  and  the  open  light  of  the  monarchy,  did  they 
turn  every  event  into  another  trait  in  the  picture  of  the 
patriarchs,  till  they  elaborated  out  of  connnon  history  that 
most  extraordinary  set  of  legends  which  the  patriarchal 
story  exhibits  ?  And  to  crown  all,  when  these  events 
were  still  fresh  in  the  memory  of  men,  did  Hosea  and 
Amos  and  such  men  presently  make  use  of  these  legends 
to  point  the  moral  of  their  prophecies  ?  It  is  a  most 
insufficient  explanation  of  these  stories  to  say  that  tliey 
give  us  "no  historical  knowledge  of  the  patriarchs,  but 
only  of  the  time  when  the  stories  about  them  arose."  We 
want  at  least  to  know  why  the  facts  of  history,  patent 
and  well  known,  were  dressed  up  in  this  fashion ;  and  if 
there  is  anything  more  in  the  stories  than  this  reference 
to  facts  of  history,  we  ought  to  be  told  what  it  is.  How 
is  it,  in  particular,  that  the  patriarchal  story,  referring, 
according  to  this  theory,  to  events  quite  isolated  and  even 
far  apart  in  time  and  place,  should  hold  so  well  together 
in  a  connected  family  history  ? 

The  modern  critical  historians  are  here  ready  with 
their  theory  that  these  genealogies  of  tlie  patriarchs  are 
the  legendary  accounts  of  the  origin  and  relations  of  the 


124  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

tribes,  and  that  such  stories  "  grew  up  "  at  various  local- 
ities with  which  the  name  of  one  or  another  of  the  leg- 
endary forefathers  was  associated,  each  locality  giving  the 
version  that  most  magnified  the  tribe  in  which  it  lay. 
"  It  would  be  quite  possible,"  says  Wellhausen,^  "  to  pre- 
sent the  composition  and  relative  position  of  any  given 
people  at  a  given  time  in  a  similar  way  in  the  form  of 
a  genealogical  early  history;"  and  he  adds^  that  "the 
genealogical  form  lends  itself  to  the  reception  of  every 
sort  of  materials."  But  tlie  attempt  to  translate  these 
family  genealogies  and  movements  into  tribal  formations 
and  migrations,^  even  when  made  with  all  the  freedom 
critics  assume  to  themselves,  is  not  by  any  means  so  suc- 
cessful as  they  would  have  us  believe ;  and  Wellhausen's 
remark  might  be  met  with  the  rejoinder  that  it  would  be 
quite  possible  to  represent  the  genealogical  history  of  any 
number  of  individuals  in  tlie  form  of  accounts  of  the 
composition  and  relative  position  of  peoples  at  any  given 
time.  The  question  is  not  what  it  would  be  easy  to  do, 
but  why  the  thing  was  done  just  in  this  way.  Wellhausen 
confesses  tlie  difficulty,  though  not  its  magnitude,  in  regard 
to  what  one  would  consider  the  most  striking  of  all  the 
patriarchs,  Abraham  himself.  After  telling  us  that  "in 
the  patriarchal  legend  the  etlinographic  element  is  always 
predominant,"  he  says :  *  "  Abraham  alone  is  certainly  not 
the  name  of  a  people  like  Isaac  and  Lot;  he  is  somewhat 
difficult  to  interpret.  That  is  not  to  say,  that  in  such  a 
connection  as  this  we  may  regard  him  as  a  historical 
person ;  he  might  with  more  likelihood  be  regarded  as  a 
free  creation  of  unconscious  art.  He  is  perhaps  the 
youngest  figure  in  the  company,  and  it  was  probably  at  a 

'  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  319.  2  i^id.^  p.  320. 

»  See  Note  XI.  ■»  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  320. 


Abraham  a  "Free  Creation."  125 

comparatively  late  period  that  he  was  put  before  his  son 
Isaac."  We  are  not  informed  how  late  this  period  was ; 
but  we  are  told  positively  that  at  the  time  of  Amos  "  he 
scarcely  stood  at  the  same  stage  as  Isaac  and  Jacob."  ^ 
AH  this,  however,  looks  very  like  a  breakdown  of  the 
theory  by  which  these  genealogies  were  to  be  explained. 
One  would  like  to  know  how  much  of  the  story  of  Isaac, 
as  a  popular  legend,  would  be  comprehensible  without  a 
reference  to  that  of  Abraham  ;  or  whether  it  was  adjusted 
at  a  "  comparatively  late  period  "  after  the  "  free  creation  " 
of  Abraham,  by  unconscious  art.  And  how  can  the  one 
"locality"  be  accepted  as  explaining  these  stories  about 
such  different  characters  as  Abraham  and  Isaac  which  yet 
are  "  so  similar  that  they  cannot  possibly  be  held  to  be 
independent  of  each  other  "  ?  Students  of  folk-lore  are 
familiar  with  variants  of  a  story  cropping  up  at  different 
places.  Here  we  have  not  only  variants  at  one  place, 
Beersheba,  in  regard  to  Abraham  and  Isaac,  but  also  the 
rise  at  different  places  of  different  stories,  which  are  only 
comprehensible  when  all  are  brought  together  into  a  con- 
nected whole. 

But  let  us  consider  what  is  implied  in  the  assertion 
that  these  stories  of  the  patriarchal  times  give  us  know- 
ledge only  "  of  the  time  when  the  stories  arose."  The 
whole  question  is.  When  did  the  stories  arise  ?  Suppose 
we  grant  for  a  moment  that  as  written  productions  they 
first  meet  us  in  the  ninth  century,  that  does  not  imply 
necessarily  that  the  happy  ihought  occurred  at  that  time 

1  The  only  reason  conceivable  for  this  assertion  is,  that  Amos  mentions 
the  high  places  of  Isaac  (vii.  9),  but  nowhere  refers  to  Abraham.  One 
might  as  well  infer  that  Amos  was  not  certain  of  his  own  parentage  be- 
cause he  does  not  mention  the  name  of  his  father.  Both  J.  and  E.  (see 
Note  VIII.)  have  the  story  of  Abraham,  and  either  or  both  of  them  must 
be  earlier  than  Amos. 


126  Testimony  of  Kinth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

to  the  unknown  J.  or  E.  to  set  clown  in  this  romantic 
dress  the  history  of  his  time,  and  of  events  that  were  fresh 
in  memory  or  occurring  before  the  eyes  of  his  readers. 
If  we  are  to  get  the  time  when  the  stories  arose,  then  we 
nmst  be  told  when  tliey  were  first  mooted,  in  what  narrow 
circle  they  started,  how  long  they  were  transmitted  orally, 
and  how  they  spread  till  they  became  household  words 
in  the  eighth  century,  when  Amos  and  Hosea  refer  to 
them  as  undoubted  facts.  Let  us  take  Wellhausen's  own 
canon  in  order  to  find  out  when  the  stories  arose.  This  is 
what  he  says :  ^  "  This  later  age  is  here  unconsciously 
projected,  in  its  inner  and  its  outward  features,  into  hoar 
antiquity,  and  is  reflected  there  like  a  glorified  mirage." 
If  it  is  indeed  the  case  that  outward  as  well  as  inner 
features  are  projected  backward,  then  we  must  find  a 
time  when  nomad  life  was  the  rule,  and  the  land  was 
thinly  inhabited,  so  that  the  originator  of  these  patri- 
archal stories  may  fulfil  the  conditions.  For  be  it  ob- 
served, these  writers  of  a  "  later  age  "  do  not  describe  the 
patriarchs  as  bakers  or  dressers  of  sycamore -trees  like 
themselves,  as  the  Dutch  artists  used  to  paint  the  patrir 
archs  dressed  in  knickerbockers.  From  the  time  of 
Solomon  men  had  sat  under  their  vine  and  their  fig^ 
tree ;  "  To  the  tent !"  was  only  the  cry  for  battle ;  agricul- 
ture was  common ;  the  land  well  peopled  long  before  the 
ninth  century.  Who  was  this  J.  or  E.  who  could  so 
accurately  describe  nomad  life  that  had  long  passed  away, 
and  picture  the  land  in  a  condition  in  wliich  it  could  not 
have  been  in  his  own  time  ?  He  is  something  more  than 
a  spinner  of  legend;  he  is  a  writer  of  romance.  The 
accuracy  of  the  picture  which  he  draws  is  attested  by 
modern  life  in  the  East,  and  it  is  well  known  how  much 

^  Hist.,  p.  319. 


Outward  Features  projected  into  Antiq^idty,         127 

more  lifelike  these  stories  have  become  since  ralesliiie 
travel  and  research  have  thrown  light  upon  them.  And 
here,  again,  it  might  be  well  if  German  writers,  instead  of 
confining  themselves  to  "underground"  criticism,  would 
go  forth  into  the  daylight  of  Eastern  life  and  learn  what 
it  teaches.  If  a  writer  reflects  his  age,  if  a  story  bears 
the  impress  of  the  time  when  it  arose,  then  we  seek  in 
vain  for  a  time  in  which  to  place  the  origin  of  these  stories, 
betw^een  the  early  time  when  nomad  life  was  practicable 
in  Palestine  and  these  modern  days  of  half-settled  life. 
Wellhausen,  in  fact,  is  conscious  of  an  incongruity  in  his 
position,  thougli  he  does  not  confess  that  it  renders  the 
theory  untenable.  "  It  is  remarkable,"  he  says,^  "  that 
the  heroes  of  Israelite  legend  show  so  little  taste  for  war, 
and  in  this  point  of  view  they  seem  to  be  scarcely  a  true 
reflection  of  the  character  of  the  Israelites  as  known  from 
their  history."  2  And  then,  turning  his  back  upon  his 
own  theory  for  the  moment,  he  goes  on  to  say  that  a 
people  **  incessantly  driven  into  war  not  only  dreamed  of 
an  eternal  peace  in  the  future,  but  also  embodied  the 
wishes  of  its  heart  in  these  peaceful  forms  of  the  golden 
age  in  the  past."  This  is  a  nice  illustration  of  lucics  a  noii 
lucendo  to  begin  with ;  and  it  is  quite  opposed  to  his 
own  theory  in  the  second  place.  Maurice  Yernes  is  more 
consistent,^  for  he  regards  the  accuracy  of  description  of 
pastoral  life  in  these  narratives  as  another  proof  of  the 
high  culture  of  the  post-exilian  period,  which  could  invest 
the  life  of  the  shepherd  with  such  charm ;  and  he  hints, 
besides,  that  late  writers  at  Jerusalem  could  have  obtained 
models  for  their  stories  from  the  shepherds  on  the  cast  of 
Jordan. 

As  to  the  contention  that   these   stories  grew  up  at 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  321.  2  g^e  Note  XII.  '  ii(<sullats,  &c.,  p.  197. 


128  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

various  localities,  it  may  be  freely  conceded  that  stories 
generally  do  come  from  the  places  at  which  the  events 
which  they  relate  occurred.  It  may  also  be  admitted 
that  traditions  are  coloured  to  some  extent  by  the  age  in 
which  they  find  literary  expression.  But  this  applies  to 
any  written  history — even  to  those  that  are  written  in 
this  nineteenth  century.  All  this,  however,  is  a  very 
different  thing  from  saying  that  the  old  traditions  of 
Israel  relating  to  the  patriarchal  age  rest  on  no  foundation 
of  fact  in  that  age,  and  that  they  have  no  positive  value 
beyond  the  evidence  they  give  of  the  tendencies  of  the 
age  in  which  they  first  find  literary  expression.  Even  if 
these  traditions  were  first  committed  to  writing  in  the 
ninth  century — even  if  they  rested  on  no  pre-existing 
writings, — they  were  not  inventions  of  the  time,  but  the 
accepted  beliefs  of  the  nation  before  they  could  be  put 
forth  as  matters  of  common  acceptance ;  and  the  essential 
problem  before  us  is  to  explain  how  the  national  beliefs 
took  just  this  form. 

I  believe  that  practically  the  only  answer  which  modern 
writers  give  to  this  question  is,  that  all  nations  have 
delighted  in  tracing  back  their  history  and  national  in- 
stitutions to  great  ancestors,  who  are  but  mythical  per- 
sonages, and  that  Israel  has  only  done  the  same.  It  may 
be  freely  admitted  that  we  find  historical  peoples  carrying 
back  their  history  and  their  genealogy  to  ancestors  lying 
beyond  the  range  of  historic  certainty.  But  sober  his- 
torians do  not  on  that  account  reject  these  legends  as 
of  no  historic  value,  or  dismiss  them  as  merely  the  reflec- 
tions of  the  times  in  which  they  are  first  committed  to 
writing ;  it  is  their  part  to  seek  to  interpret  them,  and  to 
discover  the  earlier  historic  facts  which  lie  at  their  foun- 
dation.    And  we  cannot  object  to  the  application  of  a 


Hebrew  Legends  and  Pagan  Myths.  i®3& 

similar  criticism  to  the  earlier  traditions  of  Israel,  nor 
think  it  strange  if  the  facts  underlying  them  turn  out  in 
certain  respects  to  be  something  different  from  the  literal 
sense  of  the  forms  in  which  they  are  embodied.  It  is  one 
thing,  for  example,  to  say  that  a  pious  veneration  or  a 
simple-minded  tradition  invested  with  a  nimbus  of  great- 
ness the  formative  characters  of  its  early  history,  and  quite 
another  thing  to  say  that  these  characters  were  formed 
out  of  late  events  by  a  process  of  legend-spinning.  It  is 
one  thing  to  seek  to  find  out  the  bare  historical  events  of 
the  lives  of  Wallace  and  Bruce  ;  it  would  be  quite  another 
thing  to  make  these  heroes  the  legendary  outgrowth  of  the 
events  that  brought  about  the  union  of  the  kingdoms  of 
Scotland  and  England.  In  regard,  however,  to  these 
traditions,  tw^o  points  have  to  be  borne  in  mind,  which 
mark  a  contrast  between  Israelite  and  Gentile  legends. 

(1.)  The  so-called  legendary  characters  are  very  unlike 
the  legendary  characters  of  pagan  myth.  There  is 
nothing  hazy  or  indistinct  or  semi-divine  about  them.  In 
their  doings  we  see  alike  the  workings  of  human  frailty, 
the  nicest  idiosyncrasies,  the  most  strongly  marked  indi- 
viduality ;  there  is  no  effort  made  to  conceal  their  faults 
or  to  set  one  on  a  higher  pedestal  tlian  his  neighbour. 
The  characters  of  Abraham  and  Isaac,  for  example,  the 
legends  regarding  whom  are  referred  to  the  same  local- 
ities, and  are  said  to  rest  on  identical  facts,  are  as  dis- 
similar as  any  two  characters  in  Scripture.  And  all  move- 
ments and  activities  of  these  early  personalities  are  set 
in  such  a  framework  of  time  and  place,  that  if  the  char- 
acters are  not  drawn  from  the  life,  they  are  the  work  of 
a  romancer,  not  of  a  weaver  of  fairy  tales  and  legends. 
Stade  himself  has  said  ^  that  to  ordinary  Christians  of  the 

^  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  4. 
I 


^30         Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eijlith  Centuries. 

present  day,  Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob,  Saul,  David,  and 
Solomon,  Samuel  and  Elijah,  are  better  known  than  the 
heroes  of  their  own  history,  and  that  for  the  mass  of  our 
people  the  Biblical  history  is  history  in  general.  The  reason 
why  these  characters  make  this  strong  impression  on  the 
popular  mind  is  not  so  much  that  they  are  heroes  of  sacred 
history,  as  because  their  individuality  is  so  strongly 
marked.  The  most  ordinary  reader  of  the  Bible  never 
confounds  one  of  the  patriarchs  with  another,  nor  thinks 
of  mixing  up  the  deeds  of  one  with  the  doings  of  another. 
It  is  very  different  with  the  heroes  of  pagan  mythology, 
where,  in  the  dim  shadow  of  a  time  attempted  to  be  re- 
called, the  figures  resemble  one  another,  perform  the  same 
feats,  and,  as  we  attempt  to  grasp  their  characters, 
fade  away  into  unsubstantial  phantoms.  If  these  early 
figures  of  Israelite  history  are  the  creations  of  art,  it  is 
art  of  the  highest  kind  ;  and  in  any  case,  it  is  clear  that 
the  legends — if  legends  they  are — are  cast  in  a  better 
mould,  and  have  been  preserved  in  the  caskets  of  a  purer 
national  memory. 

(2.)  Another  striking  difference  is  this :  Pagan  nations 
trace  back  their  origin  and  the  origin  of  their  institutions 
to  some  great  ancestor  who  embodies  in  himself  all  the 
potentialities  of  his  race.  The  farther  back  they  can 
place  him,  the  greater  dignity  is  conferred  upon  the  race  ; 
the  higher  the  antiquity,  the  more  illustrious  the  history. 
Now  in  the  case  of  Israel  we  find  a  series  of  sucli 
ancestors  and  a  succession  of  men  to  whom  the  moulding 
of  the  nation's  life  is  attributed.  To  be  parallel  with 
pagan  legend,  the  Israelite  tradition  ought  to  ascribe  all 
to  Abraham,  or  even  to  Heber,  the  father  of  the  race  of 
the  Hebrews.  But  though  to  Abraham  is  traced  in  a 
special  manner  the  beginnings  of   the  religion  and  the 


Well-marked  Periods  in  Early  History.  131 

ancestry  of  the  race,  the  story  of  Jacob-Israel,  which  is 
quite  different  in  its  cast,  is  as  important  a  link  in  the 
chain  of  the  tradition.^  And  so,  though  Moses  appears  as 
the  founder  of  nationality  in  a  special  sense,  his  greatness 
is  not  enhanced  either  by  making  the  antecedent  history  a 
blank,  void  of  all  knowledge  of  religion,  or  by  leaving  noth- 
ing to  be  done  by  his  successors.  The  period  of  Samuel 
comes  again  as  a  well-marked  crisis  in  the  history  ;  and  the 
reigns  of  David  and  Solomon  have  their  distinct  features 
as  steps  in  the  national  development.  All  this  is  quite 
different  from  the  legendary  stuff  out  of  which  the  earlier 
histories  of  pagan  nations  have  to  be  expiscated,  and  it 
is  simply  impossible  to  make  them  the  inventions  of  a 
myth-spinning  imagination.  The  only  conclusion  we  can 
come  to  in  view  of  such  facts,  if  we  are  to  attempt  to 
construct  Israel's  history  from  the  materials  before  us 
and  not  from  our  own  notions,  is  that  these  names  or 
characters  do  represent  distinct  phases  in  the  growth  of 
the  nation,  and  that  it  was  because  they  possessed  strongly 
marked  characteristics  that  they  have  been  depicted  with 
such  striking  individuality.  It  is  impossible  to  explain 
the  national  belief  in  these  epochs  which  we  find  at  the 
clear  historical  period  of  the  eighth  century,  without 
assuming  that  something  characteristic  and  positive,  as 
matter  of  fact,  attached  to  each  of  them,  and  made  its 
impress  on  the  nation's  heart  and  was  preserved  in  the 
national  memory. 

There  is  a  temptation,  which  is  very  seductive,  to  adopt 
what  may  be  called  a  nebular  hypothesis  of  early  history. 
Having  fixed  upon  what  we  consider  the  earliest  histori- 
cal period,  we  are  apt  to  suppose  that  the  succession  of 
the  race  before  that  period  was  maintained  by  existences 

1  Konig,  Ilauptprobleme  der  altisraelitischen  Religionsgeschichte,  p.  19. 


133  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

of  a  nebular,  unformed,  half-human  character,  forgetting 
that  it  is  only  the  distance  of  our  standpoint  that  makes 
the  characters  indistinct.  Could  we  get  near  enough 
to  the  age  in  which  Abraham  is  placed  by  the  Biblical 
writers,  we  should  discover  that  it  was  an  age  of  human 
beings  of  parts  and  passions  like  ourselves,  for  that  matter ; 
and  at  all  events,  of  individuals  no  doubt  very  much  such 
as  these  writers  depict.  Thoreau  says  in  one  place :  ^  "  On 
beholding  a  picture  of  a  New  England  village  as  it  then 
appeared  [viz.,  in  the  time  of  the  Indian  wars],  with  a 
fair  open  prospect,  and  a  light  on  trees  and  river  as  if  it 
were  broad  noon,  we  find  we  had  not  thought  the  sun 
shone  in  those  days,  or  that  men  lived  in  broad  daylight 
then."  Similarly  Carlyle,  in  regard  to  the  '  Chronicle  of 
Jocelin,'^  exclaims:  "Behold,  therefore,  this  England  of 
tlie  year  1200  was  no  chimerical  vacuity  or  dreamland, 
peopled  with  mere  vaporous  Eantasms,  .  .  .  but  a  green 
solid  place,  that  grew  corn  and  several  other  things.  The 
sun  shone  on  it;  the  vicissitude  of  seasons  and  human- 
fortunes.  ...  In  wondrous  Dualism,  then  as  now,  lived 
nations  of  breathing  men;  alternating,  in  all  ways,  be- 
tween Light  and  Dark ;  between  joy  and  sorrow,  between 
rest  and  toil  —  between  hope,  hope  reaching  high  as 
Heaven,  and  fear  deep  as  very  Hell."  In  this  matter 
all  depends  upon  the  nearness  of  the  point  of  view,  and 
modern  writers  vary  in  the  length  of  their  vision,  for 
some  would  make  not  only  the  patriarchs,  but  Moses  and 
Joshua,  or  even  David  and  his  contemporaries,  little  more 
than  "  vaporous  Eantasms."  The  question  is,  whether  at 
this  late  time  we  are  in  possession  of  materials  that  enable 
us  to  bridge  the  gulf  of  so  many  centuries,  and  take  our 

1  Walk  to  Wachusett,  quoted  in  '  Life '  by  H.  A.  Page,  p.  38. 
-  Past  and  Preisent,  Book  II.  chap.  i. 


}Vliat  constitutes  a  Historical  Period  1  133 

stand  in  broad  daylight,  or,  at  all  events,  in  a  light  suffici- 
ently bright  to  enable  us  to  distinguish  individuals  in  the 
great  mass  of  antiquity.  It  is  not  in  our  present  plan  to 
refer  to  the  archaeological  discoveries  of  the  present  cen- 
tury. It  may  merely  be  mentioned  in  passing  that  those 
tablets  of  Tell-el-Amarna,  for  example,  cause  to  start  into 
life  a  period  that  has  hitherto  been  regarded  by  many  as 
very  nebulous,  and  set  us  down  on  the  solid  soil  of  Pales- 
tine a  century  before  the  exodus,  among  men  with  very 
ordinary  occupations  and  very  human  feelings ;  and  tlie 
monuments  of  Egypt  and  Assyria  carry  us  back  in  a  very 
striking  way  to  those  ages,  and  bring  them  within  the 
sphere  of  historical  knowledge.^  Apart  from  these,  how- 
ever, does  not  this  age  of  the  first  writing  prophets  at 
once  enable  us  to  take  up  firm  standing-ground  at  that 
period  at  least,  and  put  us  face  to  face  with  men  who 
have  surely  some  right  to  be  heard  in  regard  to  their 
nation's  history  ?  Although  modern  historians  will  assert 
that  this  is  the  earliest  writing  age  (without,  however, 
having  proved  it),  it  is  evident  that  it  was  not  an  age  at 
which  Israel,  as  a  nation,  was  waking  up  out  of  the  uncon- 
sciousness of  antecedent  dreamland,  and  rubbing  its  eyes 
and  asking  whence  it  came.  It  has  something  very  definite 
and  positive  to  say  for  itself.  Wellhausen  says  that  the 
stories  of  the  patriarchs  differ  from  the  traditions  in  re- 
gard to  earlier  times ;  and  so  they  do.  The  question  is, 
whether  they  are  the  creations  of  the  national  imagina- 
tion, as  he  says,  or  the  treasured  traditions  of  the  national 
memory.  And  when  from  the  writing  prophets  we  can, 
by  the  aid  of  the  song  of  Deborah,  not  to  mention  other 
compositions,  pass  to  firm  historical  ground  in  the  time 
of  the  Judges,  it  does  not  seem,  after  all,  to  be  such  an 

1  See  Note  XIII. 


134  Testimony  of  Ninth  and  Eighth  Centuries. 

extravagant  thing  to  believe  that  individuals  named 
Abraham,  Isaac,  and  Jacob  were  positive  historical  char- 
acters, whose  existence  was  stamped  indelibly  on  the  pop- 
ular memory.  Some  events  need  no  books  to  preserve 
them;  they  are  written  on  the  tablets  of  thousands  of 
hearts,  and  transmitted  with  their  life-blood  to  children's 
children.  Suppose,  for  illustration,  that  we  find  public 
speakers  in  Scotland  in  this  century  appealing  to  the 
deeds  of  Wallace  and  Bruce,  and  referring  to  the  battle 
of  Bannockburn,  in  order  to  arouse  national  shame  or 
national  enthusiasm,  and  that  the  references  are  not  chal- 
lenged, but  set  forth  in  the  confident  and  assured  tone  of 
Hosea  and  Amos,  this  would  surely  be  convincing  proof 
that  these  matters  were  part  of  the  nation's  historical 
possession.  Yet  if  you  ask  nine  out  of  every  ten  Scots- 
men for  a  proof  of  the  existence  of  AVallace  and  Bruce, 
or  of  the  occurrence  of  the  battle  of  Bannockburn,  they 
will  probably  be  at  a  loss  to  give  it.  You  could  easily 
show  that  "  Bruce's  Address  "  was  written  by  Burns  cen- 
turies after  the  time  at  which  the  battle  is  placed,  and 
lie  had  no  ancient  documents  to  go  upon ;  and  from  the 
time  in  which  Burns  lived — the  time  of  our  great  wars — 
you  might  easily  prove  that  the  song  was  written  for  a 
purpose,  to  stimulate  patriotism  and  magnify  our  arms; 
and  you  could  easily  find  underlying  tlie  cliaracter  of 
Bruce  a  contemporary  of  the  poet  distinguished  in  battle. 
And  then  as  for  old  Barbour's  Chronicle,  we  find  it  so  full 
of  discrepancies,  and  so  coloured  by  superstitious  beliefs, 
that  it  may  be  rejected  as  an  untrustworthy  document,  or 
set  down  to  a  late  time — the  work  of  an  imitator  of  the 
old  language  of  the  chroniclers,  who  projected  himself 
into  the  distant  past.  Modern  critical  rewriting  of  his- 
tory, which  is  often  a  mere  parody  of  history,  is  a  trick 


The  Testimony- of  a  Nation.  135 

as  easily  learned  as  literary  parody,  and  it  is  often  as 
tiresome.  Yet  the  battle  of  Bannockburn  took  place ; 
and  the  best  proof  of  the  fact  is,  that  the  whole  nation 
believes  it,  and  has  been  and  is  at  this  moment  sensibly 
affected  in  its  very  vitals  by  the  recollection.  So  the 
great  events  of  Israel's  history,  the  turning-points,  the 
points  determinative  of  the  whole  life  and  history,  are 
attested  by  the  nation  at  the  earliest  time  at  which  we 
are  enabled  to  look  for  materials  on  which  an  opinion  can 
be  based.  No  reason  can  be  given  for  the  invention  of 
them  just  at  this  time,  or  for  the  significance  which  the 
prophets  assign  to  them.  It  may  be  that  a  fond  memory 
invested  with  a  halo  of  glory  the  great  fathers  of  the  race; 
it  may  also  be  that  a  simple  piety  saw  wonders  where  a 
modern  age  would  see  none.  Yet  the  individuality  of  the 
characters  is  not  destroyed,  nor  are  the  sequence  of  events 
and  the  delineations  of  character  shown  to  be  the  work  of 
a  fitful  and  unbridled  imagination. 


136 


CHAPTEE    VI. 

THE   KEY  OF  THE  CRITICAL   POSITION. 

The  precedinf/  inquiry  has  given  us  so  far  a  general  confirmation  of  the 
Biblical  view,  and  the  conclusion  has  been  reached  by  tahing  undisputed 
documents  in  their  natural  sense — But  since  the  modern  view  claims 
to  rest  on  a  critical  examination  of  the  documents,  we  have  to  consider 
what  the  critical  sifting  amounts  to — Stade's  statement  of  the  process 
that  has  taJcen  place  in  the  canonisation  of  books — The  historical  books  ; 
how  modified  in  accordance  with  later  views — Critical  appeal  to  con- 
temporary prophetic  writings  as  a  check  on  the  historical — Prophetical 
books,  however,  have  also  to  be  critically  sifted :  Stade's  account  of 
the  case — Examples  of  the  critical  adjustment  of  Amos  and  Hosea — 
Striking  out,  alloioing  for  unhistorical  ideas —  Want  of  fixed  objective 
standard  of  appeal — The  first  principle  of  criticism,  how  stated  and  hoio 
misapplied — The  whole  controversy,  however,  turns  round  the  question 
as  to  whether  the  prophets  were  reformers  or  originators — Two  points 
eliminated  as  not  in  dispute — Still  there  are  three  points  to  be  proved 
before  the  critical  position  can  be  adopted. 

"I  GREET  you  at  the  beginning  of  a  great  career,  which 
yet  must  have  had  a  long  foreground  somewhere  for  sucli 
a  start/'  With  these  words  Emerson  extended  to  Walt 
Whitman  a  welcome  into  the  literary  world;  and  in  a 
similar  way  we  must  greet  the  so-called  first  literary 
age  of  Israel.  By  three  distinct  lines  of  inquiry  we 
have  examined  this  age,  and  from  a  literary,  a  religious, 
and  a  historical  point  of  view,  we  conclude  that  it  must 


"A  long  Foreground  for  the  Start.'*  137 

have  had  "a  long  foreground  somewhere  for  such  a 
start."  We  have  confined  ourselves  to  such  books  or 
portions  of  books  as  are  placed  in  this  period,  and  wo 
have  found  that  by  a  safe  inference  they  lead  us  back 
to  an  anterior  time  and  an  antecedent  condition  of  things 
whicli,  substantially,  are  those  represented  in  the  books 
\vhicli  profess  to  give  us  a  record  of  those  times.  The 
testimony  of  the  writing  prophets,  Hosoa  and  Amos,  to 
the  history,  is  particularly  weighty.  When  they  refer 
to  the  past  history  of  the  nation,  they  do  so  as  to  a 
matter  well  known ;  and  when  they  give  a  particular 
representation  of  the  history,  they  leave  no  room  for 
doubt  that  the  consciousness  of  their  contemporaries  was 
with  them.  Now  what  does  this  imply  ?  It  implies 
that  the  facts  and  ideas  were  so  wrought  into  the  national 
mind  that  there  was  no  need  to  prove  or  substantiate 
them,  no  thought  of  gainsaying  them.  And  applying 
the  argument  we  have  employed  in  regard  to  the  literary 
and  religious  features  of  the  books,  we  conclude  that  a 
scheme  of  history  like  this  was  not  a  sudden  product, 
foisted  upon  their  generation  by  two  individuals.  Ee- 
Ibre  it  could  become,  as  it  clearly  had  become,  the 
settled  belief  of  the  whole  nation  in  any  one  century, 
there  must  have  been  not  merely  a  set  of  facts  on  whicli 
it  was  based,  but  a  process  of  reflection  tipon  them,  a 
holding  of  them  up  by  some  person  or  persons  before  the 
nation's  eyes,  or  a  provision  of  some  kind  for  keeping 
them  alive  in  the  nation's  remembrance.  Again,  there- 
fore, we  are  driven  back  to  an  antecedent  time,  during 
which  these  traditions  took  concrete  shape,  and  be- 
came, not  only  recollections  of  events,  but  interpreta- 
tions of  them  in  a  religious  historical  sense.  From  every 
point  of  view,  therefore,  it  appears  that  the  century  we 


138  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

are  considering  is  not  merely,  or  not  mainly,  the  starting- 
point  of  a  new  development,  but  that,  preceding  it,  there 
is  implied  a  very  considerable  stage  of  culture  and  a 
long  process  of  religious  reflection  and  education.  All 
this,  of  course,  is  not  sufficient  to  establish  the  existence 
or  composition  of  the  disputed  books  at  the  early  period 
to  which  they  relate.  It  is  enougli,  however,  to  show 
that  writings  of  a  historical  and  religious  kind,  such  as 
they  are,  might  quite  well  have  been  composed  before 
what  has  been  provisionally  called  the  first  literary  age. 
Moreover,  the  testimony  afforded  by  Hosea  and  Amos, 
and  by  writings  of  their  century,  amounting,  as  we  con- 
tend, to  the  testimony  of  the  nation  itself,  will  be  re- 
garded, by  some  minds  at  least,  as  stronger  testimony 
than  that  of  written  compositions,  and  a  sufficient  guar- 
antee that  the  disputed  books,  which  profess  to  relate 
the  earlier  national  history,  at  whatever  time  they  may 
have  been  written,  rest  upon  and  are  in  accordance  with 
the  same  tradition,  which  we  find  to  be  a  national  posses- 
sion at  the  period  of  the  undisputed  compositions. 

So  far  as  we  have  gone,  then,  we  seem  to  get  a  general 
confirmation  of  the  Biblical  theory.  And  the  conclusion 
at  which  we  have  arrived,  whatever  may  be  its  value,  has 
not  been  based  upon  any  of  the  writings  that  are  said  to 
be  late  and  unhistorical,  nor  has  any  attempt  been  made 
to  strain  words  beyond  their  natural  sense,  or  to  assume 
anything  that  ordinary  experience  and  common-sense  do 
not  warrant.  According  to  the  modern  critical  historians, 
however,  the  matter  is  not  by  any  means  so  simple  as 
this ;  for  the  conclusion  to  which  they  come,  based,  as  it 
is  claimed,  on  the  same  documents  critically  examined,  is 
very  different,  as  has  already  been  indicated.  We  must 
now,  therefore,  consider  somewhat  more  closely  what  this 


Stade  on  Canonical  Writings.  139 

critical  sifting  of  the  documents  amounts  to,  and  on  what 
principles  it  is  carried  out,  so  as  to  discover,  if  possible, 
what  residuum  of  testimony  remains  to  us  as  authorita- 
tive and  trustworthy. 

A  great  part  of  Wellhausen's  History  of  Israel  is  de- 
voted to  what  he  terms  "History  of  Tradition,"  in  which 
he  goes  over  the  historical  books  in  detail,  pointing  out 
how  later  views  have  been  superimposed  on  earlier  ac- 
counts, or  made  to  explain  or  even  originate  earlier  alleged 
events.  Stade,  near  the  beginning  of  liis  history,  lays 
down  in  a  preliminary  way,  and  more  explicitly,  the 
grounds  for  this  critical  sifting.  Canonical  writings,  he 
says,''  are  usually  affected  in  only  too  sensible  a  manner 
by  the  process  of  canonisation.  With  every  act  of  canon- 
isation there  is  inseparably  connected  a  thorough  revisal 
and  working  over — a  final  redaction,  in  fact,  of  the  work 
canonised.  The  reason  for  this  is,  that  a  definite  final 
development  of  thought  is  only  reached  after  varied 
mental  movement;  and  those  standing  at  the  end  of  a 
chain  of  development  and  looking  back  at  the  process  by 
which  it  has  been  reached,  assuming  that  the  final  form 
is  alone  right,  will  find  blanks  and  contradictions  in  the 
writings  tliat  have  been  composed  in  the  course  of  this 
development.  The  final  redaction  will  seek  to  fill  up  the 
blanks  and  to  smooth  down  the  contradictions ;  and  this 
gives  rise  to  insertions,  omissions,  and  patching  up  of  the 
original.  Even  after  canonisation  has  taken  place,  writ- 
ings are  exposed  to  defacement  in  tlie  interest  of  some 
party  or  tendency  which  has  gained  the  upper  hand  and 
possesses  the  guardianship  of  the  books. 

This  working  over  of  the  materials  of  tradition,  Stade 

^  Geschichte,  p.  14  f.  I  give  the  substance  of  the  passage  instead  of 
a  literal  translation. 


1 40  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

proceeds,  raises  special  difficulties,  inasmuch  as  the  whole 
material  is  subjected  to  a  repeated  systematic  revision  to 
adapt  it  to  the  ideas  of  each  successive  period  at  w^hich 
revision  takes  place ;  and  though  among  other  peoples 
the  historical  traditions  have  also  been  remoulded  to  suit 
later  ideas,  nowhere  is  the  process  more  energetically 
carried  out  than  where  religious  interests  come  into  play ; 
for  then  it  is  not  merely  a  case  of  touching  up  individual 
details,  but  a  radical  refashioning  of  the  whole  material 
of  tradition  in  harmony  with  the  theological  system  pre- 
vailing at  the  time. 

He  then  goes  on  to  specify  the  occasions  on  which  the 
traditions  of  Israel  were  thus  revised,  and  the  interests  in 
w4iich  they  were  refashioned.  The  historical  matter,  he 
says, underwent  three  different  revisions.  (1.)  In  the  year  621 
B.C.  was  discovered  a  law-book  (the  Code  of  Deuteronomy), 
which  became  authoritative,  and  was  made  the  basis  of  a 
reform  of  worship.  This  code,  which  professes  to  come  from 
Moses,  has  for  its  chief  requirement  that  "  the  place  which 
God  should  choose  "  on  the  west  side  of  the  Jordan — viz., 
Jerusalem — was  to  be  the  only  authorised  seat  of  sacrificial 
worship.  When  once  this  code  had  gained  recognition  and 
ascendancy,  there  ensued  a  process — beginning  in  the  end 
of  the  reign  of  Josiah  and  lasting  on  till  the  first  part  of 
the  exile — of  retouching  and  working  over  the  whole  tra- 
ditional material,  in  accordance  with  what  had  now  become 
standard  and  accepted  views.  For,  seeing  that  all  tlie 
leaders  of  the  nation  up  to  the  year  621  had  systemati- 
cally (and  naturally)  worshipped  contrary  to  the  require- 
ments of  the  Deuteronomic  Code,  these  men,  from  the  time 
of  David  and  Solomon  onwards,  must  have  seemed,  in  the 
eyes  of  a  person  brought  up  under  the  new  ideas,  nothing 
better  than  half  heathen.     But  this  was  repugnant  to  hi* 


licdactional  Revision  of  Tradition,  141 

religious  experience,  and  so  the  traditional  matter  was 
revised  under  the  ruling  ideas :  that  Israel  from  the  time  of 
Moses  had  been  a  sacred  community,  that  Moses  was  suc- 
ceeded by  Joshua,  Joshua  by  the  Judges,  and  that  Saul's 
reign  was  a  declension  from  the  divinely  appointed  organ- 
isation of  the  people.  (2.)  At  a  later  time  the  law-book 
found  in  621  was  joined  with  other  writings,  and  the  whole, 
through  Ezra's  labours,  made  the  law-book  of  the  commun- 
ity. The  most  recent  of  the  works  embraced  in  this  collec- 
tion was  the  so-called  Priestly  Code,  which  gives  another 
and  more  developed  view  of  the  history  of  Israel ;  and  in 
accordance  with  this,  again,  the  earlier  history  was  revised, 
so  as  to  agree  with  tlie  conditions  of  this  Code.  For  as  a 
fully  developed  ritual,  claiming  to  be  of  Mosaic  origin,  was 
now  in  force,  it  was  necessary  to  represent  ancient  Israel 
as  living  also  under  a  similar  organisation,  divided  into 
twelve  tribes,  with  not  only  a  sacred  tribe  of  Levi,  but  a 
family  of  Aaron  with  special  privileges.  And  whereas 
tlie  Deuteronomic  law  had  been  content  to  date  the 
unity  of  worship  from  the  time  of  Solomon's  Temple,  the 
Priestly  Code  dated  it  back  to  the  wilderness,  and  pro- 
vided the  people  with  a  tabernacle.  (3.)  Finally,  the 
books  of  Ezra,  ISTehemiah,  and  Chronicles  were  composed 
about  the  year  300  B.C.,  with  the  view  of  exhibiting  the 
whole  ancient  history  in  the  light  of  the  post -exilian 
Judaism,  and  in  accordance  with  the  circumstances  which 
arose  on  the  basis  of  the  Priestly  Code. 

These  later  revisions  of  tlie  traditional  material,  it  is  to 
be  observed,  did  not,  on  the  theory,  obliterate  the  older 
traditions,  which  are  still  capable  of  being  discovered  by 
patient  criticism.  In  regard  to  the  last  revision,  Well- 
hausen  says  it  is  a  fortunate  matter  that  "  Chronicles  did 
not  succeed  in  superseding  the  historical  books  upon  which 


142  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

it  was  founded ;  the  older  and  the  newer  version  have 
been  preserved  together."  ^  But  it  is  different  with  the 
books  of  Judges,  Samuel,  and  Kings.  Here  "  the  whole 
area  of  tradition  has  finally  been  uniformly  covered  with 
"an  alluvial  deposit,  by  which  the  configuration  of  the 
surface  has  been  determined."  ^  It  is  the  work  of  criti- 
cism to  remove  this  deposit,  to  get  below  it  to  the  earlier 
form  of  the  tradition,  and  to  assign  the  various  deposits 
to  the  dates  at  which  they  were  deposited.  In  this  pro- 
cess, we  are  told,  "it  may  stand  as  a  general  principle 
that  the  nearer  history  is  to  its  origin,  the  more  profane 
it  is."^  "  What  is  usually  given  out  as  the  peculiar  theo- 
cratic element  in  the  history  of  Israel,  is  the  element 
which  has  been  introduced  by  the  redaction.  .  .  .  This 
pedantic  supranaturalism — '  sacred  history,'  according  to 
the  approved  recipe — is  not  to  be  found  in  the  original 
accounts.  In  these  Israel  is  a  people  just  like  other 
people;  nor  is  even  his  relationship  to  Jehovah  other- 
wise conceived  of  than  is,  for  example,  that  of  Moab  to 
Chemosh."  * 

It  will  now  appear  why  at  the  outset,  to  avoid  contro- 
versy, we  left  out  of  account  certain  portions  of  the  books 
of  Judges,  Samuel,  and  Kings,  since  these,  it  is  claimed, 
have  undergone  a  Deuteronomistic  revision,^  and  also  those 
parts  of  the  Pentateuch  other  than  the  patriarchal  stories 
of  the  Jehovist,  because  the  Pentateucli  is  strongly  over- 
laid with  additions  in  the  spirit  of  the  Priestly  Code. 
Put  the  question  here  arises,  Is  it  possible,  and  if  so, 
by  what  means,  to  separate  earlier  from  late,  and  to  de- 

1  Hist.,  p.  228.  Mbid.  ^  n^i^.,  p.  245.  Mbid.,  p.  235. 

5  The  revision  in  the  spirit  of  Deuteronomy  is  usually  designated  the 
Deuteronomist,  in  distinction  from  the  Deuteronomer,  or  author  of  the 
writing  found  in  the  Temple. 


Critical  Sifting  of  the  Tradition.  143 

termine  the  time  at  wliicli  the  later  supervened  upon  the 
earlier  parts  in  those  writings  that  profess  to  be  history  ? 
To  this  Stade,  and  those  of  his  way  of  thinking,  answer 
in  effect  that  the  revisers  or  redactors  were  not  so  skilful 
as  to  entirely  conceal  what  they  worked  upon ;  that  some- 
times political  events  enable  us  to  determine  at  least 
whether  a  piece  belongs  to  the  northern  or  southern 
kingdom,  to  pre -exilian  or  post  -  exilian  ^  times,  and  so 
forth.  But  Stade  says  very  truly  ^  that  if  we  are  to  fix 
the  rise  of  any  disputed  writing,  we  must  have  a  firm 
point  by  which  to  fix  it;  and  the  prophetic  movement, 
he  adds,  furnishes  a  number  of  such  fixed  points.  It  will 
be  found,  in  fact,  that  the  whole  theory  of  the  rise  of  the 
Deuteronomic  and  Priestly  Codes  at  the  periods  to  which 
they  are  respectively  assigned,  appeals  for  support  in 
the  last  resource  to  the  prophetic  writings ;  and  so  indeed 
does  the  whole  theory  of  the  development  of  the  history. 
For  in  the  prophetical  writings  we  have  contemporary 
documents,  which  give  us  a  direct  knowledge  of  the  times 
to  which  they  belong.  They  enable  us,  therefore,  to  con- 
trol the  so-called  historical  compositions,  and  to  say  what 
is  pre-prophetic  and  what  prophetic,  since  the  whole  re- 
ligious history  was  powerfully  modified  by  prophetic 
influence. 

Leaving  out  of  view  for  the  present  the  aids  furnished 
by  political  events  and  considerations  of  general  develop- 
ment, we  seem,  on  the  admission  of  the  critical  writers,  to 
have  obtained,  in  the  writings  of  contemporary  prophets, 
a  sure  standard  by  which  to  estimate  the  statements  of 
the  historical  books,  and  to  determine  generally  the  course 
of  the  historical  development;  and  so,  in  the  preceding 
chapters,  we  have  appealed  with  confidence  to  the  books 

^  Wellhauscn,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  13.  2  Qeschichte,  i,  p.  19. 


Hi  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position, 

of  Hosea  and  Amos.  Another  complication  of  the  matter, 
liowever,  occurs  here ;  for  this  fixed  standard,  it  appears, 
is  only  to  be  accepted  with  reservation.  The  propheti- 
cal writings  also,  in  becoming  "  canonical,"  have  passed 
through  vicissitudes  similar  to  those  of  the  historical 
books.     This  is  what  Stade  has  to  say  on  the  subject :  ^ — 

"We  must,  indeed,  in  using  the  prophetical  literature,  ahvays 
keep  before  us  the  fact  that  the  judgments  found  therein  regard- 
ing historical  persons  and  circumstances  are  passed  from  a  party 
point  of  view.  Since,  however,  we  are  able  to  survey  the  prophetic 
activity  as  a  movement  running  in  a  straight  line,  and  fully  com- 
pleted, the  points  of  view  are  sufficiently  known  to  us  from  which 
the  treatment  of  the  history  was  regarded  by  the  prophets,  and  we 
are  thus  in  a  position  to  control  and  correct  their  judgments.  More- 
over, it  is  to  be  noted  that  a  writer  who  does  not  set  himself,  ex 
professo,  to  write  history  according  to  definite  guiding  principles, 
but  only  touches  on  historical  matters  by  the  way  in  the  unfolding 
of  his  thoughts,  will  never  allow  his  ideas  to  have  such  a  moulding 
influence  on  the  historical  material  as  a  historian  who  proceeds 
upon  such  principles.  He  will  probably  view  persons  and  circum- 
stances at  an  oblique  visual  angle,  and,  just  for  that  reason,  will 
not  judge  correctly.  He  will,  however,  hardly  go  so  far  as  to  draw 
generally  the  conclusions  from  his  own  ideas,  and  consequently  will 
communicate  sufficiently  accurate  details,  by  which  we  can  correct 
those  that  are  inaccurate. 

"  In  the  employment  of  the  prophetical  literature  there  is  still  a 
second  point  to  be  well  noted,  which  is  generally  overlooked.  The 
development  of  prophecy,  whose  literary  products  lie  before  us  in 
the  Old  Testament,  is  only  development  in  one  straight  line.  But 
the  development  of  human  thought  [as  explained  in  connection  with 
the  historical  writings]  is  not  in  the  habit  of  moving  in  this  one- 
sided way.  Then  we  have  besides,  in  the  prophetical  writings  of 
the  Old  Testament,  sufficient  indications  pointing  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  development  of  the  Old  Testament  prophecy  was  once  a 
much  richer  and  more  manifold  thing.  The  false  prophets  who 
were  combated  by  the  authors  of  the  prophetical  writings  that  have 


1  Geschichte,  i.  p.  80  ff. 


Critical  Sifting  of  Prophetical  Writinrjs.  145 

come  down  to  us,  are  representatives  of  divergent  prophetical  ten- 
dencies. They  also  wrote  prophetical  works.  It  is  self-evident, 
liowever,  that  only  the  works  of  such  prophets  have  been  handed 
down  as  lie  in  the  direction  of  the  prophetic  ideas  which  gained  the 
victory  and  came  to  be  universally  received.  One  of  the  things  that 
mainly  determined  this  result  was  the  circumstance  whether  or  not 
the  prophecies  of  a  prophet  had  been  fulfilled.  From  those  prophets, 
who,  in  opposition  to  Jeremiah,  prophesied  the  victory  of  the  Judiean 
state  over  Babylon,  not  a  single  work,  as  a  matter  of  course,  has 
come  doMTi  to  us.  When,  however,  it  was  a  question  of  receiving 
or  not  receiving  a  prophetic  ])iece  into  the  capon,  it  was  not  always 
so  simple  a  matter  for  a  work  to  prove  that  it  belonged  to  a  certain 
mode  of  thought;  and  accordingly,  just  when  the  collection  of  the 
writings  of  the  prophets  was  made,  there  must  have  taken  place 
a  very  special  and  thorough  overworking  of  the  material  handed 
down,  with  regard  to  the  points  of  view  explained  already  [in  con- 
nection with  the  canonisation  of  historical  writings],  and  by  means 
of  the  expedients  already  described." 

We  cannot  enter  into  all  the  questions  here  raised  as 
to  what  happened  to  books  in  the  process  of  canonisation. 
It  is  quite  apparent  that  what  is  assumed  to  have 
taken  place  is  something  very  different  from  the  events 
incident  in  the  ordinary  transmission  of  ancient  books. 
These  sweeping  assertions,  however,  are  of  no  value  un- 
less supported  by  positive  proof ;  and  it  could  be  shown 
that  the  graver  portion  of  them  is  entirely  destitute  of 
historical  foundation.^  The  struggle  between  opposing 
tendencies,  so  far  as  it  did  take  place,  lies  before  us  quite 
patent  in  the  Biblical  writings ;  nor  is  there  the  shadow 
of  proof  that  any  attempt  was  made  in  these  writings  to 
suppress  one  side  of  it ;  and  the  genuineness  of  the  wait- 
ings before  us  is  not  to  be  settled  by  such  a  priori  canons. 
But  the  thoughtful  reader  will  ask  at  this  point,  Where 
now  is  the  fixed  standard  of  appeal?  If  prophetical 
writers  wrote  under  a  bias,  which  must  be  allowed  for  and 

^  See  Konig's  Hauptprobleme,  pp.  12  ff.,  and  his  Falsche  Extreme,  p.  3. 

^r;>  Of  TK?.  ""^-^^ 

ITIHIVBP-ITY 


146  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position, 

corrected ;  if  their  writings  liave  not  come  down  to  us  in 
their  original  form,  and  require  to  be  critically  adjusted ; 
or  if  the  prophets  even  held  erroneous  views  in  regard  lo 
the  national  history,  which  have  to  be  rectified, — who 
holds  the  infallible  standard  for  determining  all  the  grave 
and  difficult  questions  which  then  arise  ?  The  answer 
will  perhaps  appear  as  we  now  proceed  to  observe  tlie 
application  of  the  critical  canons  to  the  two  books  of 
Hosea  and  Amos  on  which  we  have  hitherto  relied.  We 
have  already  seen  ^  that,  by  both  these  prophets,  a  certain 
pre-eminence  is  given  to  the  liouse  of  David  and  the 
southern  kingdom  of  Judah.  The  modern  theory,  how- 
ever, maintains  that  it  was  at  a  much  later  time  that 
this  pre-eminence  was  assigned  to  Judah,  and  that  in 
the  early  prophetic  period  the  balance  of  power  lay 
in  the  northern  kingdom.  Accordingly,  Stade  pro- 
ceeds to  strike  out  of  Amos  as  "  insertions  "  certain  ex- 
pressions (among  others^)  that  are  at  variance  with  his 
theory.  The  most  important  in  this  connection  are  the 
two  verses  4  and  5  of  chapter  ii.,  containing  the  prophet's 
denunciation  of  the  sin  of  Judah,  "because  they  have 
despised  the  law  of  the  Lord,  and  not  kept  His  command- 
ments." It  may  suit  Stade  and  others  to  regard  this  as 
an  "  insertion,"  but  it  is  important  to  observe  that  if  the 
verses  are  omitted,  there  would  be  a  singular  incomplete- 
ness of  the  whole  passage,  chapters  i.,  ii.,  in  which  Amos 
makes  a  survey  of  the  neighbouring  nations  on  every 
side,  ending  with  Israel,  to  which  he  directly  addressed 
his  words.     The  omission  altogether  of   Judah  from  the 

1  Chap.  V.  p.  111. 

2  Stade,  Gescliichte,  i.  p.  571,  footnote.  Besides  the  passage,  ii.  4,  5, 
considered  in  the  text,  the  other  portions  rejected  by  Stade  are,  iv.  1 3 
(partly),  v,  8  f.,  ix.  6.     Reference  will  be  made  to  these  in  another  place. 


Inter]polations  in  Amos  and  Hosea.  147 

survey,  tlierefore,  would  be  unaccountable  on  the  mere 
ground  of  literary  form,  to  say  nothing  further  in  tlie 
meantime  of  the  substance.  The  book  of  Hosea  fares  no 
better  at  the  hands  of  the  critics.  It  is  part  of  their  theory 
that  those  passages  in  the  historical  books  which  express 
disapproval  of  the  monarchy,  as  inconsistent  with  the  di- 
vinely organised  theocracy,  are  due  to  the  Deuteronomistic 
revision.  Since,  therefore,  Hosea  (more  than  a  century 
before  the  discovery  of  the  Deuteronomic  Code)  is  found 
to  speak  in  that  sense,  the  passages  must  be  removed. 
Stade  says :  ^  "  Since  tliis  prophet's  expectations  of  the 
future,  owing  to  his  peculiar  representation  of  the  mon- 
archy, differed  in  cardinal  points  from  the  type  of  view 
of  the  future  that  came  to  prevail  with  Isaiali,  an  attempt 
has  been  made  at  a  later  time  to  get  over  the  difficulty 
by  the  insertion  of  the  missing  details."  Consequently 
we  are  told  to  strike  out  i.  7,  ii.  1-3,  which  break  the 
connection  and  disturb  the  order  of  thought;  and  also 
in  iii.  5  we  are  to  omit  at  least  the  words  "  and  David 
their  king,"  as  well  as  iv.  15,  viii.  14,  which  refer  to 
Judah.2  Wellhausen  also  perceives  the  difficulties  that 
emerge  here,  and  has  a  similar  method  of  laying  them. 

1  Geschichte,  i.  p.  577,  footnote. 

2  The  passages  in  question  are  these  :— 

Hosea  i.  7  :  "  But  I  will  have  mercy  on  the  house  of  Judah,  and  will 
save  them  by  the  Lord  their  God,  and  will  not  save  them  by  bow,  nor  by 
sword,  nor  by  battle,  nor  by  horses,  nor  by  horsemen." 

ii.  1-3  (viz.,  in  A.  V.  i.  10  f.) :  "Yet  the  number  of  the  children  of 
Israel  shall  be  as  the  sand  of  the  sea,  which  cannot  be  measured  nor  num- 
bered :  and  it  shall  come  to  pass,  that  in  the  place  where  it  was  said  unto 
them,  Ye  are  not  my  people,  there  it  shall  be  said  unto  them.  Ye  are  the 
sons  of  the  living  God.  Then  shall  the  children  of  Judah  and  the  chil- 
dren of  Israel  be  gathered  together,  and  appoint  themselves  one  head,  and 
they  shall  come  up  out  of  the  land  :  for  great  shall  be  the  day  of  Jezreel. 
Say  unto  your  brethren,  Ammi  ;  and  to  your  sisters,  Kuhamah." 

iii.  5  :  "  Afterward  shall  the  children  of  Israel  return,  and  seek  the 


148  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position, 

He  confesses  that  Hosea  "  appears  to  have  regarded  the 
kingdom  as  such  as  an  evil ;  in  more  than  one  expression 
he  makes  it  the  antithesis  of  the  rule  of  Jehovah."  ^  And 
having  given  what  he  considers  the  explanation  of  this, 
he  says  in  a  footnote :  "  He  even  speaks  with  favour  of 
David  and  the  kingdom  of  Judah,  but  I  consider  all  such 
references  in  Hosea  (as  well  as  in  Amos)  to  be  interpo- 
lations. In  i.  7  there  is  a  reference  to  the  deliverance  of 
Jerusalem  under  Hezekiah." 

The  process  of  "  striking  out,"  however,  does  not  meet 
the  whole  difficulty.  The  teaching  of  Hosea  and  Amos 
on  important  points  is  so  ingrained  in  the  whole  books 
that  it  cannot  be  evaded.  Accordingly,  another  line  of 
explanation  has  to  be  followed.  Stade  says  :  ^  "  Hosea 
is  the  first  who  conceives  the  whole  of  the  past  from  the 
point  of  view  of  a  declension  (Ah/all),  and  his  opinion  in 
regard  to  the  monarchy  is  but  a  part  of  this  general 
view.  And  just  as  his  ideas  of  the  intercourse  of  Israel 
with  foreign  nations  had,  along  with  other  things,  a 
material  influence  on  the  later  Jewish  ideas  regarding 
the  heathen,  so  also  his  use  of  the  argument  from  his- 
tory, in  order  to  prove  to  the  people  their  deviation  from 
the  requirements  of  Jehovah  and  their  declension,  pre- 
pared the  way  for  the  unhistorical  view  that  came  to 
be  taken  of  the  past,  and  the  treatment  of  it  in  the 
light  of  later  religious  conceptions.  That  view,  which 
took  Israel's  history  as  a  sacred  liistory  under  a  process 

Lord  their  God,  and  David  their  king ;  and  shall  fear  the  Lord  and  His 
goodness  in  the  latter  day." 

iv.  15:  "Though  thou,  Israel,  play  the  harlot,  yet  let  not  Judah 
oflfend." 

viii.  14  :  "For  Israel  hath  forgotten  his  Maker,  and  buildeth  temples; 
and  Judah  hath  multiplied  fenced  cities." 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  417.  ^  Geschichte,  i.  p.  582. 


The  Final  Court  of  A2'>i:eal.  149 

of  throwing  a  light  of  its  own  on  the  actual  circum- 
stances, did  not  indeed  take  its  beginning  from  him,  but 
received  from  him  its  strongest  impulse."  ^ 

The  position  in  which  we  are  now  placed  is  this.  The 
modern  historians  have  refused  to  call  the  books  of  the 
Pentateuch  as  evidence  ;  they  have  eliminated  those 
"  summaries "  of  the  history  which  are  overlaid  on  the 
historical  books  ;  they  triumphantly  appeal  to  contem- 
porary witnesses ;  and  we  have  accepted  them.  And 
then,  when  their  own  witnesses  step  into  the  box,  and 
are  expected  to  bless  the  modern  theory,  they  curse  it 
altogether.  And  this  by  no  forced  cross-examination  on 
the  part  of  those  who  were  to  be  confuted  by  them,  but 
by  spontaneous  straightforward  statements ;  and  forthwith 
those  who  called  them  proceed  to  tell  us  that  the  evidence 
is  to  be  taken  with  reservation.  For  later  additions 
have  been  made  to  the  testimony,  and  these  must  be 
removed  before  we  can  get  the  true  statement  of  the  case. 
Nay,  these  prophets  themselves,  even  when  we  get  at 
their  own  words,  are  not  to  be  relied  on  for  matters  of 
fact  when  they  tell  us  that  other  teachers  taught  the  same 
truth  before  them,  nor  for  their  statements  of  history 
when  they  declare  that  their  nation  had  been  taught  a 
better  religion  and  had  declined  from  it.  The  question 
again  recurs,  Where  now  is  the  fixed  point  and  firm 
standard  by  which  we  are  to  reach  the  truth  ?  The 
historical  books  are  to  be  corrected  by  tlie  aid  of  the 
prophetical ;  but  where  is  the  standard  for  correcting  the 

^  Stade  is  not  by  any  means  alone  in  discrediting  the  views  of  the 
prophets.  Smend,  in  an  article  in  '  Studien  und  Kritikeu'  for  1876  on 
the  stage  of  development  in  the  Israelite  religion  presupposed  by  the 
prophets  of  the  eighth  century,  speaks  in  a  similar  strain.  He  is  criti- 
cised by  Konig,  Offenbarungsbegriff,  vol.  i.  p.  23  f. 


150  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

prophetical  books  ?  On  what  authority  are  these  "  inser- 
tions" to  be  removed;  by  what  guide  are  we  to  adjust 
the  prophetic  misapprehensions  ?  The  only  "  fixed  "  thing 
perceivable  is  the  theory  itself ;  the  only  standard  is 
*'  strike  out "  or  "  I  consider."  For  the  rest,  what  may  be 
called  by  admirers  a  delicate  process  of  criticism  may 
appear  to  others  uncommonly  like  a  piece  of  literary 
thimblerigging.  You  come  upon  the  critic  suddenly  when 
he  professes  to  be  engaged  in  one  of  those  delicate  pro- 
cesses of  criticism,  and  you  find  him  slipping  his  subjective 
scale  up  his  sleeve.  The  passages  which  disturb  a  pet 
theory  are  declared  to  disturb  the  connection.  We  have, 
in  fact,  no  contemporary  reliable  documents  till  the  critic 
lias  adjusted  them ;  and  the  theory  ultimately  is  appealed 
to  in  confirmation  of  itself. 

Looking  to  the  assumptions  made  by  Stade  as  to  what 
has  happened  to  historical  and  prophetical  books  before 
and  during  canonisation,  the  difficulty  of  getting  beneath 
the  documents  to  the  precise  facts  of  the  history  will 
appear  to  most  minds  stupendous;  and  looking  to  the 
absence  of  fixity  in  the  standard  of  judgment,  one  cannot 
help  wondering  at,  if  not  admiring,  the  confidence  with 
which  critics  set  to  work  on  the  task.  One,^  for  ex- 
ample, tells  us  that  "it  is  not  needful  in  starting  to  lay 
down  any  fixed  rules  of  procedure.  The  ordinary  laws  of 
evidence  and  good  sense  must  be  our  guides.  And  these 
we  must  apply  to  the  Bible  just  as  we  should  do  to  any 
other  ancient  book.  That  is  the  only  principle  we  have 
to  lay  down.  And  it  is  plainly  a  just  principle."  So 
undoubtedly  it  is,  if  only  all  were  agreed  as  to  what 
"the  ordinary  laws  of  evidence  and  good  sense  "  amount 

1  Robertson  Smith,  the  Old  Testament  in  the  Jewish  Church,  Lect.  i. 
p.  25. 


The  Basis  of  Historical  Inquiry,  151 

to.  Another^  of  a  more  daring  temperament,  after  giving 
his  own  sketch  of  a  part  of  the  history,  which  differs  toto 
eodo  from  that  of  the  Biblical  books,  says,  "The  sketch 
which  we  have  given  can  be  extracted  from  our  sources 
without  too  much  trouble.  In  order  to  disengage  the 
encumbrances  {surcliargcs)  which  the  theological  point  of 
view  of  the  redactor  has  introduced  into  them,  all  that  is 
wanted  {il  sujfflt)  is  a  little  practice  and  some  decision." 
Some !  Critics,  indeed,  profess  to  proceed  upon  a  prin- 
ciple which,  properly  taken,  is  the  basis  of  historical 
inquiry — viz.,  "that  every  book  bears  the  stamp  of  the 
time  and  circumstances  in  which  it  was  produced."  ^ 
But  in  the  exercise  of  this  principle  many  of  them  set 
to  work  after  the  manner  of  a  schoolboy,  who,  finding 
that  his  new  knife  can  cut  a  stick,  employs  it  in  bark- 
ing fruit-trees  and  hacking  furniture.  In  order  to  de- 
termine an  author's  time,  expressions  will  be  seized 
upon  which  might  refer  to  any  time ;  or,  his  time 
being  determined,  his  position  in  it  and  even  his  rela- 
tion to  it  will  be  circumscribed  by  our  meagre  know- 
ledge of  what  the  time  and  circumstances  were.  The 
most  lofty  poetry  may  be  degraded  into  the  dullest  prose  ; 
critics,  "  unable  to  follow  prophecy  in  its  flight,  clip  its 
wings ; "  ^  and  because,  forsooth,  a  prophet  is  to  be 
regarded  as  speaking  to  his  own  ago,  he  must  not  be 
allowed  to  see  anything  beyond  it.  Properly  speaking, 
the  first  principle  of  criticism  is  that  every  book  bears 
the  stamp  of  the  man  that  produced  it ;  and  it  is 
from  the  book  that  we  are  to  know  the  man.     It  is  not 

^  Maurice  Vernes,  Rdsultats,  p.  26. 
2  Old  Testament  in  Jewish  Church,  Lect.  i.  p.  23. 

^  So  Delitzsch  speaks  of  men  of  the  type  of  Grotius,  a  type  not  by  any 
means  extinct. — Comm.  on  Isaiah,  last  Eng.  ed.,  vol.  i.  p.  41. 


152  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position, 

legitimate  to  determine  beforehand  both  his  time  and 
his  circumstances,  and  then  to  interpret  the  whole  book 
in  the  light  of  the  position  we  have  assigned  to  the  writer. 
It  is  no  doubt  true  that  every  man  belongs  to  his  age, 
and  is  to  a  certain  extent  a  product  of  it.  But  are  there 
not  men  who  mould  their  age  ?  Are  there  not  men  in 
advance  of  their  age  ?  Are  not  the  circumstances  under 
which  an  author  writes  partly  the  influences  of  a  past 
time,  and  partly  also  the  adumbrations  of  a  coming  time  ? 
In  a  word,  to  tie  a  writer  down  to  the  circumstances 
and  surroundings  of  his  day  is  utterly  unscientific  and 
opposed  to  experience.  To  treat  Hebrew  prophets,  of  all 
men,  in  this  way,  is  simply  to  lay  down  an  insurmount- 
able barrier  to  our  understandino'  them. 
•  Of  the  critical  pretension  to  be  able  to  determine  dates 
tDf  passages  by  occult  references,  we  have  just  seen  an 
example  in  Wellhausen's  confident  assertion  that  Hosea 
i.  7  must  be  as  late  as  the  time  of  Hezekiah.  It  is  an 
example  as  good  as  many  of  those  with  which  his  pages 
are  thickly  strewn.  Different  readers  will  estimate  differ- 
ently the  ability  which  they  display.  I  confess  that  many 
of  them  do  not,  to  my  mind,  exhibit  even  "  such  a  display 
of  ingenuity  as  makes  people  clap  their  hands  and  cry 
iccll  clone!  but  does  not  seriously  persuade  them."^  If 
they  were  merely  the  occasional  coruscations  of  the  criti- 
cal wit,  serving  to  enliven  the  dull  pages,  they  might 
be  borne  with.  But  they  are,  in  fact,  advanced  with 
a  gravity  which  at  times  makes  the  reader  doubt  his  own 
sanity,  and  given  forth  as  the  results  of  critical  science, 
out  of  which  a  new  history  is  to  be  constructed. 

We  come  back,  however,  to  the  essential  point.     The 

^  Matthew  Arnold,  God  and  the  Bible,  chap.  v.  §  1.     The  whole  section 
is  well  worth  reading  in  our  connection. 


The  Parting-Point  of  the  Two  Theories.  153 

key  of  the  position  is  the  view  that  is  taken  of  the 
teaching  of  the  prophets ;  and  at  this  point  the  two 
theories  are  quite  opposed.  The  Biblical  theory  repre- 
sents the  prophets  as  continuators,  reformers,  recalling 
their  people  to  a  standard  of  religion  from  which  they 
had  fallen.  The  modern  critical  historians  place  a  wide 
gulf  between  the  pre-prophetic  and  the  prophetic  re- 
ligion, tlie  general  position  being  that  tlie  pre-prophetic 
religion  of  Israel  differed  little,  if  in  anything,  from 
the  religion  of  the  nations  who  lived  round  about 
Israel.  "  The  religion  of  David  and  Solomon,"  says 
Eenan,^  "did  not  differ  appreciably  from  that  of  the 
neighbouring  peoples  of  Palestine."  Jahaveh,  as  others 
put  it,  was  to  the  Israelites  very  much  what  Chemosh  and 
Moloch  were  to  the  Moabites  and  Ammonites.^  So  far 
from  appearing  among  the  Canaanites  with  distinctive 
religious  beliefs  and  customs,  they  resembled  them  in  all 
essential  points,  settled  quietly  among  them  in  many  or 
in  most  cases,  and  finding  their  ideas  conform  to  their 
own,  adopted  their  sacred  places,  attaching  to  them 
stories  of  their  own  tribal  heroes,  but  observing  the  re- 
ligious customs  and  worship  of  their  neighbours. 
This  is  what  Stade  says:^ — 

"  That  the  religion  of  Israel,  from  being  a  nature  religion,  became 
a  religion  of  the  spirit ;  that  such  a  religion  arose  in  the  ancient 
world  is,  in  the  first  place,  the  merit  of  the  prophetic  movement, 
and  in  the  second  place,  the  result  of  the  political  fortunes  of  the 
people.  The  prophetic  movement  had  to  wage  violent  conflicts 
with  the  popular  religion." 

And  Wellhausen,^   after    remarking   that   the   prophets, 

*  Pref.  to  second  vol.  of  Histoire  d'Israel,  p.  ii. 

2  Stade,  Geschichte,  i.  p.  429. 

»  Ibid.,  p.  9.  *  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  4C1. 


154  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

who  first  appeared  as  a  novel  phenomenon  some  time 
before  the  beginning  of  the  Philistine  war,  had  in  the 
interval  (ending  with  Ahab)  become  so  naturalised  that 
they  had  a  recognised  and  essential  place  in  connection 
with  the  religion  of  Jehovah,  goes  on  to  say : — 

"First-rate  importance  on  the  whole  cannot  be  claimed  for  the 
Nebiim,  but  occasionally  there  arose  amongst  them  a  man  in  whom 
the  spirit  which  was  cultivated  within  their  circles  may  be  said  to 
have  risen  to  the  explosive  pitch ; "  and  "  the  prototype  of  this  class 
of  exceptional  prophetis,  whom  we  not  unjustly  have  been  accus- 
tomed to  regard  as  the  true,  is  Elijah  of  Thisbe,  the  contemporary 
of  Ahab.  To  him  first,"  Wellhausen  proceeds,^  "was  it  revealed 
that  we  have  not,  in  the  various  departments  of  nature,  a  variety  of 
forces  worthy  of  our  worship,  but  that  there  exists  over  all  but  one 
Holy  One  and  one  Mighty  One,  who  reveals  Himself  not  in  nature, 
but  in  law  and  righteousness  in  the  world  of  man." 

Passing  on  to  Amos,  we  are  told  ^ — 

"  Amos  was  the  founder  and  the  purest  type  of  a  new  phase  of 
prophecy.  The  impending  conflict  of  Asshur  with  Jehovah  and 
Israel,  the  ultimate  downfall  of  Israel,  is  its  theme." 

Aizain:^ — ■ 


"The  canonical  prophets,  the  series  of  whom  begins  with  Amos, 
were  separated  by  an  essential  distinction  from  the  class  which  had 
preceded  them,  and  which  still  continued  to  be  the  type  of  the 
common  prophet.  They  did  not  seek  to  kindle  either  the  enthusi- 
asm or  the  fanaticism  of  the  multitude  ;  they  swam  not  with  but 
against  the  stream.  They  were  not  patriotic,  at  least  in  the  ordinary 
sense  of  that  word  ;  they  prophesied  not  good  but  evil  for  their 
people  (Jer.  xxviii.  8).  Until  their  time  the  nation  had  sprung  up 
out  of  the  conception  of  Jehovah;  now  the  conception  of  Jehovah 
was  casting  the  nation  into  the  shade.  The  natural  bond  between 
the  two  was  severed,  and  the  relation  was  henceforward  viewed  as 
conditional.  As  God  of  the  righteousness  which  is  the  law  of  the 
whole  universe,  Jehovah  could  be  Israel's  God  only  in  so  far  as  in 


1  Hist.,  of  Israel,  p.  462.  =  Ibid.,  p.  472.  ^  j^i^j,^  p_  473^ 


The  Founders  of  "  Etliical  Monotheism."  155 

Israel  the  right  was  recognised  and  followed.  The  ethical  element 
destroyed  the  national  character  of  the  old  religion.  It  still  ad- 
dressed itself,  to  be  sure,  more  to  the  nation  and  to  society  at  large 
than  to  the  individual ;  it  insisted  less  upon  a  pure  heart  than  upon 
righteous  institutions  ;  but  nevertheless  the  first  step  towards  uni- 
versalism  had  been  accomplished,  towards  at  once  the  general 
diffusion  and  the  individualisation  of  religion.  Thus,  although  the 
prophets  were  far  from  originating  a  new  conception  of  God,  they 
none  the  less  were  the  founders  of  what  has  been  called  'ethical 
monotheism.'  But  with  them  this  ethical  monotheism  was  no 
product  of  the  'self-evolution  of  dogma,'  but  a  progressive  step 
which  had  been  called  forth  simply  by  the  course  of  events." 

We  shall  have  occasion  to  consider  at  length  in  the 
sequel  the  various  positions  here  assumed.  In  the  mean- 
time particular  attention  must  be  called  to  this  iteration 
of  "  Amos  was  the  first  to  "  say  this  or  that,  "  Hosea  first 
perceived "  this  and  the  other  thing,  or  "  to  Elijah  was 
first  revealed"  something  else.  So  Wellhausen  says  in 
another  connection :  ^  "It  was  Amos,  Hosea,  and  Isaiah 
who  introduced  the  movement  against  the  old  popular 
worship  of  the  high  places;  in  doing  so  they  are  not 
in  the  least  actuated  by  a  deep-rooted  preference  for  the 
temple  of  Jerusalem,  but  by  ethical  motives,  which 
manifest  themselves  in  them  for  the  first  time  in  his- 
tory, and  which  we  can  see  springing  up  in  them  before 
our  very  eyes."  If  these  statements  are  allowed  to  go 
unchallenged,  they  amount  to  practically  the  begging  of 
the  whole  question — for  the  very  thing  we  want  to  prove 
is  whether  or  not  there  was  antecedent  teaching  such  as 
that  of  these  men.  But  the  statements  are  utterly  un- 
warranted by  any  facts  at  our  disposal. 

It  would  be  a  hazardous  thing  to  say  of  any  writer  in 
whose  works  we  first  come  upon  the  enunciation  of  a 
truth,  that  he  was  the  very  first  to  grasp  it.    And  in 

*  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  4  7. 


156  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

regard  to  Amos  and  Hosea  all  that  we  can  admit  in  tlie 
meantime  is,  that  these  are  the  two  who  furnish  us  the 
earliest  undisputed  contemporary  writings.  But  even  if 
they  are  the  first  to  hold  the  views  ascribed  to  them, 
is  it  necessary  to  conclude  that  they  were  mistaken 
when  they  refer  to  the  liistorical  development  of  the 
religion  ?  This  is  the  view  we  have  seen  Stade  takes 
of  Hosea — viz.,  that  he  was  wrong  in  declaring  that 
Israel  had  declined  from  the  true  religion ;  and  that 
lie  thus  prepared  the  way  for  the  unhistorical  theocratic 
view  which  came  to  prevail.  And  yet  is  not  this  just 
one  of  the  points  on  which  we  ought  to  take  the  true 
prophet  to  be  a  safe  guide  and  a  skilful  interpreter? 
The  polemic  of  the  prophets,  says  Wellhausen,^  "is  a 
purely  prophetic  one — i.e.,  individual,  '  theopneust,'  in  the 
sense  that  it  is  independent  of  all  traditional  and  pre- 
conceived human  opinions;"  and  Eobertson  Smith ^  says, 
"  The  possession  of  a  single  thought  about  Jehovah,  not 
derived  from  current  religious  teaching,  but  springing  up 
in  a  soul  as  a  word  from  Jehovah  Himself,  is  enough  to 
constitute  a  prophet,  and  lay  on  him  the  duty  of  speaking 
to  Israel  what  he  has  learned  of  Israel's  God."  Now  it 
is  undoubted  that  to  the  prophets  Israel's  God  was  closely 
connected  with  Israel's  national  life ;  it  was  "  God  in 
history,"  not  God  in  His  essence,  that  was  tlie  subject  of 
their  study,  the  theme  of  their  teacliing.  And  if,  on  their 
own  proper  theme,  in  their  own  prophetic  spliere,  they  are 
wrong,  in  what  respect,  we  may  ask,  are  they  true  prophets 
at  all? 

Supposing  still,  however,  that  these  prophets  "  were 
the  first "  to  teach  as  they  did,  let  us  consider  the  situa- 
tion that  arises.     What  we  would  have  to  believe  is  that, 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  48.  2  Trophets,  p.  182. 


Introduction  of  a  New  Idea  of  History.  157 

whereas,  as  Wellliausen  ^  expresses  the  matter,  tlie  nation 
had  up  to  the  time  of  Hosea  been  tlie  ideal  of  the  re- 
ligion in  actual  realisation,  and  the  people  at  large  had  no 
feeling  that  they  were  doing  anything  inconsistent  with 
the  principles  of  the  national  religion,  this  prophet  now 
confronted  them  with  a  new  ideal,  and  taught  them  that 
their  present  religious  position  was  a  declension  from  an 
earlier  one.  Now  it  is  conceivable  that  a  view  taken  up 
by  Hosea  or  Amos  might  afterwards  become  the  basis  of 
an  unhistorical  conception ;  it  is  conceivable  that  Hosea 
or  Amos  may  have  given  hints  of  past  events  or  person- 
ages that  were  afterwards  expanded  into  so-called  history. 
But  I  doubt  very  much  whether  the  ideas  of  a  whole 
generation  as  to  its  own  past  history  are  thus  produced 
by  the  neio  teaching  of  one  or  two  men.  For  if  the  view 
originated  with  Hosea,  and  gained  acceptance  straightway 
on  his  word,  we  have  to  suppose  that  this  one  man  not 
only  introduced  a  new  conception  of  the  whole  of  the 
past  history,  but  obliterated  from  the  consciousness  another 
conception  of  it  which  had  previously  existed.  If  lan- 
guage has  any  meaning  at  all,  the  hearers  of  Hosea  were 
at  one  with  him  as  regards  the  facts  of  the  history  and 
their  significance,  however  degenerate  they  were  in  prac- 
tice. In  the  line  of  prophets  that  follow  Hosea,  we  see  no 
indication  of  the  gradual  acceptance  of  his  view,  which 
must  have  taken  place  if  it  was  new.  His  view  is  that 
of  all  the  prophets.  The  position,  in  fact,  is  entirely 
forced  and  unnatural,  and  shows  simply  the  shifts  to 
which  one  is  reduced  in  pushing  his  theory  through  at 
all  hazards.  Moreover,  we  are  not  so  anxious  in  the 
meantime  to  know  the  influence  of  Hosea's  views  on 
succeeding  times,  as  to  know  the  origin  of  Hosea's  own 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  491. 


158  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

views ;  and  as  to  this,  the  vital  point,  we  get  no  in- 
formation. Modern  writers  demand  development;  but 
we  have  now  found  and  shall  always  find  that  when 
it  comes  to  a  vital  point  like  this,  their  development 
breaks  down :  whereas  the  Biblical  writers  set  before 
us  a  development  which,  at  all  events,  in  this  case 
is  comprehensible,  and,  taken  in  connection  with  the 
explicit  declarations  of  the  prophets  before  us,  answers 
the  conditions  of  the  present  problem.  For  it  is  to  be 
observed  that  Hosea  does  not  deal  in  generalities  in 
stating  his  view.  It  might  have  been  supposed  that,  like 
other  moralists,  he  was  a  laudator  temporis  acti,  and  being 
of  a  melancholy  spirit,  dwelt  on  the  "  good  old  times  "  that 
were  gone.  But  this  is  not  the  case.  He  does  indeed 
speak  of  the  early  love  of  Jahaveh's  bride  for  her  Hus- 
band, and  he  does  blame  tlie  people  of  his  age  for  falling 
very  low ;  but  he  lays  his  finger  on  certain  positive  sins 
in  their  past  history,  and  indicates  definite  places  in  which 
their  sin  had  been  most  flagrant^ — a  proof  that  he  was 
not  talking  at  large  or  inventing  past  history — a  proof 
that  the  conscience  of  the  nation  could  not  gainsay  what 
was  laid  to  its  charge. 

And  now,  before  examining  in  detail  the  fundamental 
points  in  dispute,  let  us  eliminate  the  elements  of  the 
problem  in  regard  to  which  there  is  no  controversy. 

1.  In  the  first  place,  it  is  not  denied  that  the  prophets 
waged  war  against  the  popular  religion  and  worship. 
The  prophets  themselves  tell  us  so,  and  the  historical 
books  no  less  distinctly.  The  question  simply  is,  Was 
the  popular  religion  with  which  they  were  in  conflict  the 
only  accepted  and  recognised  religion  of  the  nation  up  to 
their  time,  or  was  it  a  declension  from  it  and  perversion  of 

^  See  Hosea  iv.  15  ff.  ;  ix.  10,  15  ;  x.  5  ;  xiii.  1. 


The  Prophets  and  the  Popular  Pelif/ion.  "  1'50 

it  ?  The  modern  school  leaves  it  to  be  inferred  that  it 
was  the  religion  of  Mosaism ;  and  Diihm  seems  to  say  as 
.much  when  he  declares  ^  that  the  prophetic  consciousness 
was  at  variance  with  tlie  Jahaveh  religion  as  it  was  rep- 
resented at  the  Temple  of  Solomon ;  and  Wellhausen  also, 
when  lie  says :  ^  "  In  old  times  the  nation  had  been  the 
ideal  of  religion  in  actual  realisation :  the  prophets  con- 
fronted the  nation  with  an  ideal  to  which  it  did  not  cor- 
respond." So  far  as  the  attitude  of  the  prophets  to  the 
mere  externals  of  religion  is  concerned,  we  shall  have  to 
speak  at  length  by-and-by.  In  the  meantime,  we  insist 
upon  the  recognition  of  a  religion  altogether  distinct  from 
the  popular  conceptions  and  the  popular  abuses  which  the 
prophets  condemned.  And  the  more  sober-minded  writers 
of  the  critical  school  do  not  deny  this.  Eeuss,  for  example, 
says:^  "We  are  persuaded  that  the  essential  elements  of 
the  collective  view  of  the  prophets  are  older  than  our 
oldest  witnesses."  So  Smend  says :  '^  "  Clearly  there  were 
fundamental  views  of  religion  which  the  people  had  in 
common  with  the  prophets."  It  is  difficult  to  understand 
how  any  other  view  of  the  matter  could  be  entertained  in 
the  face  of  the  two  facts,  (1)  that  the  prophets  themselves 
ever  appeal  to  the  conscience  of  the  people  in  attesta- 
tion of  the  truths  which  they  deliver ;  and  (2)  that  the 
people  in  Elijah's  days,  for  example,  should  have  recog- 
nised the  force  of  the  appeal  so  readily  and  universally, 
and  acted  upon  it  so  energetically.  From  the  beginniug 
to  the  end  there  cannot  be  found  a  passage  in  which  a 
prophet  speaks  as  if  he  were  uttering  a  new  or  strange 
truth,  and  there  are  many  expressions  plainly  implying 
that   they  were   simply  enforcing  what   they  and   their 

1  Theol.  d.  Propheten,  p.  10  ff.     Cf.  p.  53.  2  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  491. 

s  Geschichte,  p.  316.  ■•  Theol.  Stud.  u.  Krit.,  1876,  pp.  599-66i. 


ICO  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

hearers  accepted  as  undisputed  and  indisputable.  This  is 
a  feature  of  the  prophetic  teaching  to  which  the  modern 
theory  does  not  give  sufficient  weight.  It  is  quite  charac- 
teristic. If  we  compare,  for  example,  the  claims  of  Mo- 
hammed on  the  attention  of  liis  countrymen,  we  find  thnt 
lie  indeed  appeals  to  antecedent  teachers  who  had  taught 
the  same  truth,  but  he  insists  upon  it  that  now,  in  his 
jierson,  there  was  a  special  promulgation  of  the  truth  to 
the  people  of  Arabia.  ISTay,  the  Gospel  itself  claims  to 
rest  upon  Old  Testament  revelation ;  yet  the  Founder  of 
Christianity  spoke  with  authority,  setting  his  "  I  say  unto 
you  "  over  against  the  commands  of  the  men  of  old  time ; 
and  St  Paul  contrasts  the  time  of  Gospel  revelation  with 
the  antecedent  times  of  ignorance.  The  Old  Testament 
prophets,  however,  give  us  no  hint  that  they  have  got  a 
clearer  or  more  precise  message  to  their  times  than  had 
been  given  of  old  time.  On  the  contrary,  they  describe 
their  own  times  as  degenerate  and  apostate,  and  no  one 
dares  to  contradict  them.  The  consensus  of  the  whole 
"  goodly  fellowship  "  of  the  prophets  on  this  point  should 
not  be  lightly  passed  over. 

As  to  the  existence  of  an  ideal  religion  side  by  side 
with  an  actual  one,  the  experience  of  the  world  has 
proved  but  too  clearly  that  the  practices  of  a  people,  or 
their  ordinary  conceptions  in  any  given  epoch,  are  not  to 
be  confounded  with  the  principles  of  the  faith  wliich  they 
profess.  Eeligious  belief  and  religious  practice,  indeed, 
so  react  upon  one  another,  and  practice,  as  experience 
shows,  is  so  strong,  that  it  would  be  vain  to  search  for 
a  people  at  any  time  exhibiting  a  ^mre  faith  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  expression.  "We  need  not  expect  to 
find  in  ancient  Israel  a  faith  untarnished  by  superstition 
or  free  from  the  limitations  of  ignorance.     It  is  both  un- 


The  Popular  Religion  Corrupt,  161 

scientific  and  unscriptural  to  look  in  the  Old  Testament 
for  either  a  theology  or  a  religious  life  which  was  sem- 
fer,  uhique,  et  ah  omnibus.  But  it  is  surely  easy  enough 
to  distinguish  between  hindrances  or  corruptions  and 
purity  of  germ.  What  the  prophets  themselves  plainly 
represent  is,  that  there  had  been  made  known  to  their 
people  of  old  time  a  better  faith  and  a  purer  worship 
than  those  of  the  heathen  nations,  or  of  their  own  degen- 
erate people ;  and  in  testimony  of  this,  they  think  it  suffi- 
cient to  appeal  to  the  consciences  of  their  hearers.^ 

At  the  same  time,  we  must  recognise  to  the  full 
what  was  the  actual  condition  of  the  popular  religion. 
The  Biblical  writers  do  not  conceal  this  from  us,  but 
prophet  and  historian  alike  dwell  upon  it  as  evidence  of 
the  national  defection.  In  the  first  place,  they  admit  that 
the  ancestors  of  Israel  were  idol- worshippers,  when  they 
say  that  the  fathers  of  the  patriarchs  "  beyond  the  river  " 
Euphrates  served  other  gods,  and  claim  for  Abraham  a 
special  knowledge  of  the  true  God.  Then  history  and 
experience  alike  go  to  show  that  the  sojourn  in  Egypt 
had  a  deteriorating  influence  on  the  old  patriarchal  faith  , 
and  finally,  the  position  of  the  people  in  the  midst  of  the 
idolatrous  nations  of  Canaan  and  surrounding  lands  is 
ever  to  be  kept  in  view  in  estimating  the  complex 
product  of  religious  life  at  the  time  at  which  we  have 
undoubted  contemporary  accounts.  When  we  remember 
how  long  it  takes  for  pure  religious  conceptions  to  work 
themselves  into  the  practical  recognition  of  a  nation,  how 
isolated  Israel  was  in  its  days  of  independence  among 
surrounding  nations,  and  above  all,  how  much  tendency 
there   is  in  human   nature  —  as  witness   the   course   of 

^  Cf.  also  Micah  vi.  4,  Jer.  vii.  25,  Isa.  Ixiii.  11,  Mai.  iv.  4.  Cf.  Konig, 
Oflfenbarungsbegriff  des  Alten  Testaments,  vol.  i.  p.  57. 

L 


162  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

ecclesiastical  history — by  the  imperfection  of  language 
for  one  thing,  and  by  the  infirmity  of  human  nature 
above  all,  to  run  down  to  practical  heathenism ;  and  how 
superstitious  ideas  and  superstitious  practices  survive 
even  when  there  is  no  external  inciting  motive, — we  need 
not  wonder  at  the  low  ideas  which  prevailed  among  the 
common  people  in  the  days  of  Amos  and  Hosea  and  much 
later,  or  at  the  tenacity  with  which  superstition  kept  its 
hold  long  after  the  purest-minded  of  the  prophets  had  de- 
livered their  message.  The  thing  we  do  wonder  at  is,  how  a 
succession  of  prophets  kept  so  far  above  the  level  of  the 
ordinary  conceptions,  and  the  wonder  does  not  cease  but 
takes  a  new  phase  when  we  come  back  to  the  only  true 
explanation — viz.,  that  this  nation,  so  perverse  and  yet  so 
highly  favoured,  had  been  at  an  earlier  time  the  recipient 
of  a  higher  truth,  up  to  whose  level  the  best  of  the  nation 
strove  to  keep  their  contemporaries. 

2.  Nor  need  it  be  disputed  that  there  was  an  advance 
m  the  prophets'  own  conceptions  of  religion.  In  main- 
taining that  there  was  a  national  religion  made  known 
to  Israel  and  preserved  by  the  prophets,  apart  from  the 
mere  popular  conceptions,  we  are  not  to  be  held  as  main- 
taining that  some  complete  scheme  of  theology  was  in 
their  hands,  from  which  there  was  no  possibility  of  ad- 
vance. The  writings  of  the  prophets  are  before  us  to 
refute  such  an  idea,  should  it  be  entertained.  The  days 
are  past  when  it  was  thought  admissible,  in  arguing  a 
theological  point,  to  cite  texts  promiscuously  from  any 
of  the  books  of  Scripture,  because  all  were  inspired ;  and 
to  handle  the  Bible  as  if  it  were  a  code  or  encyclopaedia 
of  theological  doctrines.  Nor  need  we  expect  the  reli- 
gion taught  by  the  prophets  to  be  a  philosophical  or 
theological    system.       The    truth    which    the    prophets 


Progress  in  Prophetic  Conceptions.  163 

tanght  was  in  themselves  a  germinating  influence,  and 
whether  by  the  events  occurring  on  the  political  stage, 
or  by  their  own  God-guided  reflections,  or  by  the  condi- 
tion of  the  men  among  whom  they  lived  and  moved,  they 
rose  from  a  lower  to  a  higher  stage  of  spiritual  percep- 
tion. The  works  of  the  writing  prophets  which  lie  before 
us  show  a  variety  in  each  writer's  conception  of  Jahaveh's 
character  and  of  His  relation  to  Israel  and  the  world 
at  large.  Amos  dwells  particularly  on  the  attribute  of 
righteousness ;  Hosea's  favourite  mode  of  viewing  God 
is  from  the  side  of  love ;  while  Isaiah  represents  Him 
as  the  exalted  one,  the  sovereign  ruler.  But  we  are 
never  safe  in  making  any  individual  writer  the  ex- 
ponent of  any  single  conception — as  many  are  inclined 
to  do.  The  various  views  of  the  prophets  are  not  so 
much  stages  in  an  orderly  progression,  as  different 
aspects  of  one  truth  which,  from  personal  temperament 
or  from  the  nature  of  his  surroundings,  each  prophet 
was  led  to  emphasise,  although  each  one  gives  indica- 
tions more  or  less  explicit  that  other  aspects  of  it  are 
not  ignored  by  him.  We  may  not  indeed  observe  a 
strict  advance  from  attribute  to  attribute  in  the  case  of 
each  succeeding  writer,  yet  there  is  on  the  whole  an 
advance  in  the  one  grand  conception  as  the  periods  suc- 
ceed one  another,  till  at  a  certain  late  stage  we  can  note 
a  marked  difference  as  compared  with  the  earlier.  The 
ideas  of  Jeremiah  and  Ezekiel,  for  example,  are  a  clear 
advance  upon  the  more  general  truths  taught  by  Amos ; 
but  there  is  no  inconsistency  between  them — there  is 
simply  the  advance  in  spiritual  perception.  Later  proph- 
ets have  a  wider  idea  of  the  world,  but  they  have  the 
same  idea  of  the  relation  of  God  to  it.  To  the  mind 
of    all    tlie    prophets    and    Old    Testament   writers,   the 


164  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

"nation  is  the  unit  of  organisation  and  life.  Even  the 
new  covenant  of  Jeremiah  is  made  with  the  people; 
though  it  operates  first  upon  individuals,  it  is  in  order 
to  gather  them  into  a  people."^  What  is  maintained 
is,  that  the  point  from  which  the  very  earliest  prophets 
start  is  not  the  low  platform  of  nature  religion,  or  even 
the  narrow  ground  of  simple  national  religion,  but  one 
mfinitely  higher,  and  one  reached  by  an  antecedent  de- 
velopment which  the  modern  school  will  insist  on  placing 
farther  down  in  history — in  other  words,  that  from  the  first 
the  idea  is  moral  or  ethical  and  not  naturalistic.  That 
the  prophets  should  have  attained  purer  and  more  spiritual 
conceptions  of  Jahaveh  as  time  went  on  and  events 
taught  them,  it  is  but  reasonable  to  suppose  ;  though  here, 
as  elsewhere,  we  must  beware  of  putting  that  first  in 
order  of  time  which  appears  most  elementary  in  concep- 
tion :  for  all  prophets  had  not  the  same  insight ;  and  it 
might  be  given  to  one  at  a  comparatively  early  period  to 
catch  glimpses  of  a  truth  which  men  of  a  succeeding  age 
hardly  perceived,  The  post-exilian  prophets,  for  example, 
do  not  seem  on  the  whole  to  have  ever  reached  the 
height  attained  by  Isaiah  and  Jeremiah,  although  they 
enjoyed  the  advantage  of  having  their  prophecies  to  in- 
struct them.  Even  the  prophecies  of  Balaam  are  in  one 
respect  more  advanced  than  those  of  the  second  half  of 
the  book  of  Isaiah :  for  in  the  latter  there  is  a  constant 
polemic  against  the  gods  of  the  heathen,  whereas  in  the 
former  the  unique  character  of  Jahaveh  is  boldly  asserted. 
It  was  by  political  events  and  the  fate  of  the  nation  gen- 
erally that  the  best  spirits  were  educated  into  more  spir- 
itual truths,  and  the  progress  of  the  evolution  or  reve- 
lation of  divine  truth  was  controlled,  as  always,  by  provi- 

^  A.  B.  Davidson,  in  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  177. 


Prophetic  and  Pre-prophetic  Religion.  165 

dential  circumstances ;  but  the  truth  to  be  developed  was 
already  there. 

These  two  points  being  admitted,  however,  there  still 
remains  for  the  new  theory  the  difficulty  of  explaining 
the  prophetic  ideas  apart  from  an  antecedent  revelation 
of  them  to  the  nation.  The  modern  historians,  in  their 
negation  of  a  pure  pre-prophetic  religion,  are  ever  faced 
with  the  task  of  explaining  the  rise  of  pure  prophetic 
religion.  They  do  not  allow  themselves  a  sufficient  start- 
ing-point for  the  development ;  for  the  prophetic  religion, 
when  we  meet  it,  is  not  of  a  germinal  or  elementary  char- 
acter. They  are  forced  to  make  sudden  transitions  and 
assume  such  extraordinary  changes,  as  invest  the  theory 
with  difficulties  much  greater  than  those  attending  the 
Biblical  view. 

I  confess  that  it  is  extremely  difficult  for  me,  not  only 
to  believe  the  position  that  is  taken  up,  but  even  to  ap- 
prehend it  as  a  possibility.  That  Israel,  with  nothing 
distinctively  peculiar  to  start  with  beyond  the  bare  belief 
that  Jahaveh  was  their  only  national  God,  should  have 
adopted  and  absorbed  elements  the  most  diverse,  and  still 
have  remained  Israel ;  that  the  elements  absorbed  should 
have  been  the  most  distinctively  heathenish  and  low,  and 
yet  that  the  result  of  it  all  was  not  an  eclecticism,  but  a 
product  sui  generis ;  and  that  all  the  time  this  transmu- 
tation was  going  on,  a  body  of  men,  whose  official  basis 
rested  on  heathenism,  should  have  lashed  their  country- 
men with  invective  and  threatening  for  forsaking  the  re- 
ligion of  their  fathers,  —  all  this  is  to  me  as  great  a 
psychological  and  moral  miracle  as  any  of  the  miracles 
recorded  in  Scripture.  Before  we  can  accept  it  as  a 
true  account  of  Israel's  religious  development,  we  must 
be  satisfied  on  three  points. 


166  The  Key  of  the  Critical  Position. 

First,  It  must  be  shown  by  clear  proofs  that  before  the 
time  of  the  writing  prophets  the  religious  beliefs  and  ob- 
servances of  Israel  were  on  the  same  level  as  those  of 
their  neighbours,  and  that  this  state  of  things  was  accepted 
by  the  enlightened  men  of  the  time  as  the  normal  and 
authorised  religion. 

Second,  Some  differentiating  element  must  be  pointed 
out  sufficient  to  explain  the  fact  that  Israel  remained 
Israel  all  this  time.  In  other  words,  a  national  reliojion 
sufficient  to  mark  off  the  people  as  a  nation  must  be 
exhibited. 

Tliird,  The  process  of  development  must  be  pointed  out 
in  the  historical  stadia,  through  which,  from  the  rudimen- 
tary stage,  Israel  arrived  at  the  *'  ethic  monotheism "  of 
the  prophets. 

The  chapters  that  follow  will  be  devoted  to  a  considera- 
tion of  these  points.  In  chapters  vii.  to  x.  the  main 
points  relied  upon  to  prove  the  low  tone  of  pre-prophetic 
religion  will  be  discussed.  Chapter  xi.  will  treat  of  the 
Jahaveh  religion ;  and  in  chapter  xii.  we  shall  consider 
in  what  way  it  is  alleged  the  pre-prophetic  passed  into 
the  prophetic,  and  Israel  arrived  at  the  ethic  monotheism 
of  the  prophets. 


167 


CHAPTEE    VII. 

PRE-PROPIIETIG   RELIGION — NAMING   OF   THE   DEITY. 

Statement  of  the  critical  position  as  to  the  low  tone  of  the  pre -prophetic 
religion,  and  various  lines  of  proof  indicated — Subject  of  the  present 
chapter:  Consideration  of  the  argument  d/rawn  from  the  names  of 
Deity — It  is  argued  from  the  free  use  of  the  name  of  Baal  in  the 
formation  of  proper  names,  that  the  persons  so  employing  it  had  no 
aversion  to  the  Baal  worship — Argument  examined :  Baal  as  a  common 
appellative  name — Condition  of  Israel  in  Canaan  described — Parallel 
cases  of  syncretism  at  the  present  day — No  case  can  he  cited  of  un- 
doubted names  of  heathen  deities  being  so  used — The  argument  drawn 
from  the  correspondence  of  Hebrew  names  with  those  of  Babylonian 
deities — The  argument  proves  too  much,  and  the  mode  of  bestowing 
names  is  different  from  the  usual  Hebreio  custom — This  whole  mode 
of  reasoning  proceeds  on  a  false  system  of  mythologising,  and  fails  to 
furnish  the  historical  proof  which  is  wanted. 

That  the  religion  of  Israel  before  the  time  of  the  writins 
prophets  was  on  the  level  of  the  religions  of  neigh- 
bouring peoples,  and  that  these  prophets  first  taught  the 
truth  of  monotheism,  are  positions  so  confidently  asserted 
in  modern  times  that  the  ordinary  reader  is  apt  to  take 
them  as  truths  that  cannot  be  disputed.  Thus  Pfleiderer 
says  ^  it  may  be  taken  as  tolerably  certain  that  the 
Hebrews  in  their  prehistoric  period  participated  in  the 
polytheistic  nature-religion  of    the  rest  of   the  Semites. 

'  Die  Geschichte  der  Religion  (1869),  p.  273. 


168  iSfaming  of  the  Deity. 

And  with  more  definiteness  of  detail,  and  indicating 
more  precisely  what  period  of  time  is  referred  to,  Kuenen 
says :  ^  "  At  first  the  religion  of  Israel  was  polytheism. 
During  the  eighth  century  B.C.  the  great  majority  of  the 
people  still  acknowledged  the  existence  of  many  gods, 
and,  what  is  more,  they  worshipped  them.  And  we  can 
add  that  during  the  seventh  century,  and  down  to  the 
beginning  of  the  Babylonish  exile  (586  B.C.),  this  state  of 
things  remained  unaltered.  Jeremiah  could  say  to  his 
contemporaries,  without  fear  of  contradiction, '  According 
to  the  number  of  thy  cities  are  thy  gods,  0  Judah '  (Jer. 
xi.  13 ;  ii.  28).  This  polytheism  of  the  mass  of  the  people 
cannot  be  regarded  as  a  subsequent  innovation ;  on  the 
contrary,  everything  is  in  favour  of  its  originality.  In  the 
accounts  of  the  preceding  centuries  we  never  seek  for  it 
in  vain.  But — and  this  is  decisive — the  prophets'  con- 
ception of  Jahveh's  being  and  of  His  relation  to  Israel  is 
mexplicable,  unless  the  God  whom  they  now  acknowledge 
to  be  the  only  one  was  at  first  only  one  of  many  gods. 
The  relation  in  which  Jahveh  stands  to  Israel  is  the  same 
as,  for  instance,  that  of  Chemosh  to  the  Moabites ;  Jahveh 
would  never  have  become  Israel's  special  property,  as  it 
were,  and  would  never  have  come  to  dwell  exclusively  in 
Canaan,  if  he  had  been  lield  from  the  beginning  to  be  the 
only  true  God.  That  limitation  is,  on  the  contrary,  ex- 
tremely natural,  if  he  was  originally  Israel's  tribal  God, 
who,  as  such,  had  many  other  gods  beside  him." 

The  proofs  which  are  adduced  in  support  of  this  posi- 
tion are  many  and  various.  It  is  maintained,  for  example, 
that  the  Israelites  spoke  of  their  God  in  the  same  way 
as  their  neighbours  spoke  of  their  gods,  and  even  applied 
to  Him  the  names  of  Gentile  deities,  or  regarded  those 

1  Religion  of  Israel  (Eng.  tr. ),  vol.  i.  p.  223  f . 


Low  Stage  of  Pre-prophetic  Religion.  169 

deities  as  possessing  similar  powers  and  attributes;  that 
they  regarded  Him  as  limited  to  one  place  or  certain  places, 
and  powerful  only  or  chiefly  in  His  own  territory ;  that 
they  thought  it  not  derogatory  to  His  dignity  to  make 
visible  representations  of  their  deity ;  that  moral  qualities 
were  not  prominent,  or  even  essential,  in  the  conception 
of  His  character ;  or  even,  as  some  critics  maintain,  that 
they  considered  it  a  religious  duty  to  offer  to  Him  human 
sacrifices. 

All  these  points  are  held  to  be  capable  of  proof  from 
the  writings  to  which  we  have  restricted  ourselves,  and, 
as  features  of  the  religion  of  Israel,  they  are  maintained 
to  be  distinctly  visible  in  the  period  of  which  we  have 
undoubted  historic  knowledge.  Not  only  so;  but  it  is 
asserted  also  that  we  have  conclusive  proof  that  these 
religious  beliefs  rest  upon  and  grow  naturally  out  of  a 
more  primitive  stage  of  religious  culture,  the  lower  con- 
dition of  animism  or  fetishism  which  characterises  the 
most  savage  peoples.  Says  Kuenen :  ^  "To  what  one 
might  call  the  universal,  or  at  least  the  common  rule, 
that  religion  begins  with  fetishism,  then  develops  into 
polytheism,  and  then,  but  not  before,  ascends  to  mono- 
theism— that  is  to  say,  if  this  highest  stage  be  reached — 
to  this  rule  the  Semites  are  no  exception ;"  and  Stade  pro- 
ceeds elaborately  to  prove  that,  in  the  documents  before 
us,  we  have  clear  indications  of  the  survival  of  these 
primitive  conceptions  and  beliefs  to  historic  times. 

To  the  proofs  brought  forward  in  support  of  these  posi- 
tions, we  must  therefore  now  turn  our  attention ;  and  in 
this  chapter  we  consider  primarily  the  argument  based 
upon  the  Hebrew  mode  of  naming  the  Deity. 

We  have  to  consider,  first  of  all,  the  argument  drawn 

^  Religion  of  Israel  (Eng.  tr.),  vol.  i.  p.  225. 


1 70  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

from  the  free  use  of  the  name  of  Baal  in  forming  proper 
names,  even  in  the  families  of  the  most  pious  Israelites. 
Thus  Tiele:^  "Even  so  zealous  representatives  of  Jali- 
vism  as  Saul  and  David  named  their  children  after  Baal. 
Solomon,  who  built  a  magnificent  temple  to  Jehovah,  saw 
in  that  no  hindrance  to  his  erecting  sanctuaries  also  for 
other  gods,  which,  by  later  writers,  was  indeed  imputed 
to  him  as  a  sin,  but  not  by  his  own  contemporaries.  The 
Baal  whom  the  prophet  Elijah  in  the  northern  kingdom 
so  vigorously  contended  against  was  not  the  native  Baal, 
but  the  Phoenician,  whom  the  Sidonian  princess  Jezebel, 
Ahab's  wife,  had  introduced.  His  pupil  Elisha  and  his 
adherent  Jehu  rooted  out  this  foreign  cultus  with  vio- 
lence, but  they  did  not  interfere  with  the  cultus  of  the 
native  Ashera." 

Now  it  is  a  well-known  fact  that  the  Israelites,  like 
other  Semitic  nations,  used  the  name  of  deity  to  a  large 
extent  in  the  formation  of  personal  proper  names. 
Names  compounded  with  El,  like  Israel,  and  with  parts 
of  Jahaveh,  like  Jehoram.  are  the  commonest  in  the  lan- 
guage of  nomenclature  ;  and  it  cannot  be  disputed  that 
the  word  Baal  is  thus  found  in  compound  proper  names, 
and  that,  too,  in  the  families  of  persons  most  distinguished 
for  their  reverence  for  the  national  God  of  the  Hebrews. 
In  the  genealogical  lists  of  Chronicles,  we  find  a  son  of 
Saul  named  Eshbaal  (1  Chron.  viii.  33;  ix.  39)  called 
Ishbosheth  in  2  Sam.  ii.  8,  and  a  son  of  David  named 
Beeliada  (1  Chron.  xiv.  7).  We  have  even  such  a  com- 
bination as  Bealiah  (Baal  is  Jah)  (1  Chron.  xii.  5)  as  the 
name  of  one  of  David's  adherents  at  Ziklag.  Moreover, 
there  is  the  well-known  passage  in  Hosea  (ii.  16,  17), 
"And  it  shall  be  at  that  day,  saith  the  Lord,  that  thou 

^  Kompendium  der  Religionsgeschichte,  §  53. 


Use  of  the  Name  Baal.  171 

shalt  call  me  Ishi  [my  husband],  and  shalt  call  me  no 
more  Baali  [my  master].  For  I  will  take  away  the 
names  of  the  Baalim  out  of  her  mouth,  and  they  shall 
no  more  be  mentioned  [or  remembered]  by  their  name." 
Here,  then,  is  plain  proof,  not  only  that  the  name  Baal 
was  used  in  the  formation  of  proper  names  without  any 
sense  of  impropriety  attaching  to  it,  but  that  the  Israel- 
ites of  the  northern  kingdom,  even  up  to  Hosea's  days, 
called  their  national  God  their  Baal.  It  does  not,  how- 
ever, follow  that  they  identified  their  national  God  with 
the  Baal  of  the  surrounding  Canaanites  in  the  attributes 
they  ascribed  to  him,  much  less  that  the  pious  parents 
who  gave  such  names  to  their  children  named  them  pur- 
posely after  the  Baal  of  the  Phoenicians  or  Canaanites. 

To  make  this  clear,  it  is  necessary  to  remember  that 
the  word  haal  was  a  common  noun  among  the  Hebrews, 
a  part  of  the  language  which  they  had  in  common  with 
other  Semitic  races.  It  is  not  a  question  here  of  going 
back  to  the  original  meaning  of  a  word,  and  basing  an 
argument  upon  some  old  application  of  it,  or  on  the  sup- 
posed primary  signification — a  process  of  reasoning  which 
sometimes  leads  to  great  confusion.^  In  the  language  as 
spoken  at  the  time  to  which  the  passages  cited  refer, 
and  as  a  common  word  in  the  language,  we  find  haal,  in 
the  sense  of  lord  or  master  (spelled,  as  we  should  say,  with 
a  small  h).  In  Exod.  xxi.,  in  the  so-called  "  Book  of  the 
Covenant,"  we  find  it  used  in  both  the  senses  of  husband 
of  a  wife  ^  and  owner  of  an  ox.^  In  the  same  way  the 
verb  haal,  in  the  sense  of  to  rule  over,  be  master  of,  is 

1  See  Note  XIV. 

2  *'  If  he  is  baal  of  a  wife,  his  wife  shall  go  out  with  him  "  (v.  3). 

3  "  If  an  ox  gore  a  man,  &c.,  the  baal  of  the  ox  shall  be  quit"  (v.  28  ; 
of.  V.  29). 


172  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

found  in  use  in  the  language  down  to  the  time  of  Isaiah, 
who  employs  it  in  the  verse,  "other  lords  besides  thee  have 
had  dominion  over  us  "  (Isa.  xxvi.  13),  and  even  as  late  as 
the  time  when  the  books  of  Chronicles  were  written.^  To 
put  it  otherwise,  there  is  no  reason  to  suppose  that  the 
Hebrews  first  used  the  word  haal  after  they  came  into 
Canaan  and  became  acquainted  with  the  Baal  worship 
practised  there.  Like  the  other  word  adon,  which  also 
means  lord,  it  was  a  general  appellative  name.  The  wife 
called  her  husband  haali  (my  lord),  and  the  slave  called 
his  owner  by  the  same  name.  And  if  a  pious  Israelite 
had  been  asked  who  was  the  god  whom  he  and  his  family 
or  nation  revered,  there  could  have  been  to  him  no  im- 
propriety in  saying  that  his  Baal  or  his  Adon  {i.e.,  his 
Lord,  with  a  capital  letter)  was  Jahaveh.  Tiie  suffix 
in  the  passage  in  Hosea  shows  that  the  word  was 
used  in  this  appellative  sense.  So  when  an  Israelite 
said,  "Jahaveh  is  our  Elohim,"  he  was  employing  the 
word  Elohim  which  denoted  the  gods  of  the  nations,  a 
plural  word  which  may  have  had  its  origin  among  a 
polytheistic  people;  but  we  cannot  conclude  from  such 
phraseology  that  he  put  Jahaveh  on  the  level  of  the  gods 
of  the  nations,  for  the  expression,  when  it  occurs,  gener- 
ally denotes  the  very  reverse.^  But  the  circumstances  to 
which  Hosea  refers  show  where  the  danger  lay,  and  how 
it  actually  emerged.  The  Canaanites,  having  the  same 
word  in  their  language,  with  that  mythological  tendency 
to  which  all  language  is  liable,  had,  so  to  speak,  come  to 
write  Baal  with  a  capital  letter.  It  was  the  only  name 
they  had  for  their  god,  or,  at  all  events,  they  used  it  and 
Adon  as  proper  names,  and  hence  the  origin  of  the  myth- 

'  See  1  Chron.  iv.  22,  "who  had  the  dominion  in  Moab." 
•'  See  Note  XV. 


The  Canaanite  Baalim.  173 

ological  Baal  and  Adonis.  Moreover,  not  having  attained, 
or  not  having  held  fast  to,  the  idea  of  one  god,  they  made 
"  lords  many,"  so  that  there  was  a  lord  ihaal  or  adon)  of 
this  or  that  quality  or  place ;  the  lordship  of  one  became 
a  host  of  Baalim.  So  long  as  Israel  was  not  involved  in 
this  system — and  the  very  fact  of  the  free  use  of  the  word 
haal  as  an  appellative  at  the  time  when  they. were  con- 
fessedly professors  of  the  Jahaveh  religion,  is  proof  to  me 
that  the  idolatrous  use  was  of  gradual  and  later  growth — 
they  might  use  the  word  haal  in  the  old  sense,  because  it 
connoted  nothing  inconsistent  with  their  ancestral  religion. 
Not  only  Hosea,  however,  but  the  historians  of  Israel  as 
well,  tell  us  only  too  plainly  how,  in  the  northern  king- 
dom, there  took  place  a  mingling  of  impure  elements  with 
the  old  Jahaveh  religion.  From  a  simple  naming  of  shrines 
as  they  were  named  among  the  Canaanites,  their  lips  and 
ears  became  familiarised  first  with  the  religious  nomen- 
clature, and  then  with  the  religious  conceptions  of  their 
neighbours.  The  Baal  of  this  place  had,  we  may  suppose, 
the  reputation  of  curing  this  disease,  and  the  Baal  of  that 
of  giving  good  harvests,  and  so  on ;  just  as  the  Virgin  of 
certain  places  and  the  local  saints  have  at  the  present 
day.  Little  by  little,  through  their  children  associating 
with  those  of  the  Canaanites,  through  the  servants  and 
labourers  who  belonged  to. the  soil,  through  the  atmo- 
sphere, as  we  say,  tlie  Israelites  conformed  to  the  poly- 
theistic ideas.  Among  the  mass  of  the  people,  if  an 
actual  syncretism  did  not  take  place,  the  sharp  distinc- 
tion between  Jahaveh  and  Baal  was  dulled  and  blunted, 
and  thus  came  about  the  situation  so  graphically  painted 
by  Hosea,  when  the  corn  and  wine  and  oil  were  ascribed 
to  the  goodness  of  the  haalim}  and  the  people  were  in 

^  The  association  by  Hosea  of  religious  decleusiou  with  material  pros- 


174  Nammg  of  the  Deity. 

danger  of  forgetting  that  Jahaveh  who  was  the  God 
of  their  nation  was  one  lord.  Any  one  who  has  lived 
in  foreign  countries  knows  how  insidiously,  through  daily 
use  of  language  and  common  associations  of  life,  one  comes 
to  think  somewhat  as  the  natives,  and,  employing  their 
language,  to  give  inadvertently  a  tacit  recognition  to  their 
beliefs.  And  the  case  we  have  supposed  has  its  actual 
parallel,  so  far  as  the  use  of  a  name  with  different  con- 
notations goes.  The  Mohammedans  give  God  the  name 
of  Allah.  It  is  the  common  Arabic  name  for  God ;  and 
the  Arabic-speaking  Christians  who  live  side  by  side  with 
them  use  the  same  name.  But  a  Mohammedan  who 
knows  his  Koran,  and  a  Christian  who  knows  his  New 
Testament,  attach  very  different  ideas  to  the  common 
name  which  they  employ;  and  though  both  are  mono- 
theists,  no  doubt  each  has  some  confused  notion  that  the 
God  whom  he  worships  is  actually  a  different  being  from 
the  deity  of  the  other.  Yet  in  outlying  places  in  Syria, 
where  education  is  not  known,  a  practical  syncretism 
takes  place,  so  that  though  the  Muslims  and  Christians 
recognise  themselves  as  such  respectively,  they  can  give 
very  little  account  of  the  distinction  that  separates  them, 
and  pay  in  common  a  superstitious  reverence  to  the  same 
localities  or  sacred  objects.^     It  is  not  difficult  to  conceive 

perity  should  not  be  overlooked.  In  the  same  way  in  the  book  of  Judges, 
periods  of  rest  always  precede  times  of  subjection.  This  is  the  philosophy 
of  history  which  is  common  to  all  the  Old  Testament  writers. 

^  Some  years  ago  I  met  at  Jerusalem  a  young  Syrian  Christian  who 
had  been  sent  by  the  Bishop  of  Jerusalem  (Bishop  Gobat)  as  an  evangelist 
to  Es-Salt  (Ramoth-Gilead).  He  found  Muslims  and  Christians  living 
side  by  side  engaged  in  the  tillage  of  the  soil,  each  sect  recognising  them- 
selves as  adherents  of  their  ancestral  religion,  but  unable  to  explain  the 
difference  subsisting  between  them,  except  in  certain  formal  expressions 
or  observances,  "Are  you  a  Christian?"  he  would  say  to  one,  and  the 
answer  was,   "I  am."     "What  is  your  faith?"     "In  the  name  of  the 


Hoseas  Reference  to  the  Name  of  Baal.  175 

how  such  a  syncretism  should  have  occurred  in  the  north- 
ern kingdom,  on  the  account  given  by  the  Biblical  writers, 
that  it  was  cut  off  from  religious  communication  with  the 
southern,  in  which  the  Temple  stood,  and  that  it  con- 
tained, besides,  a  larger  admixture  of  Canaanitish  elements. 
Hosea's  words  become  intelligible  when  it  is  perceived 
tliat  the  word  haal,  innocent  enough  in  itself,  and  cap- 
able of  being  employed  in  a  good  sense,  had  been  the 
occasion  of  so  much  mischief.  The  very  word,  he  said, 
would,  in  the  coming  time,  be  taken  out  of  their  lips, 
shunned  for  its  evil  associations  and  the  painful  recollec- 
tions which  it  awakened ;  and  the  idea,  good  enough  in 
itself,  which  it  once  denoted,  that  Israel  was  the  wife  of 
Jahaveh,  would  be  expressed  by  another  term,  which  had 
the  same  meaning,  but  was  not  surrounded  with  the  same 
associations.  Parallel  cases  in  ecclesiastical  and  political 
history  will  at  once  occur  to  the  mind  of  the  reader.  All 
this,  I  say,  is  conceivable  on  the  Biblical  view  that  Israel 
had  fallen  from  a  better  faith  and  practice  ;  but  it  is  hardly 
conceivable  on  any  supposition  that  at  Hosea's  time,  or 
immediately  before  it,  the  Israelites  connoted  no  more  by 
the  name  Jahaveh  than  the  Canaanites  did  by  the  name 
of  the  Baalim,  and  that  Hosea,  for  the  first  time,  was  try- 
ing to  raise  them  from  an  ancestral  polytheism  or  syncre- 
tism to  the  recognition  of  one  God.     Such  a  supposition 

Father  and  of  the  Son  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  "  Are  you  a  Muslim  ? " 
another  was  asked,  and  he  could  repeat,  * '  In  the  name  of  the  merciful 
and  compassionate  Allah,"  and  perhaps  "  there  is  no  deity  but  Allah ;  Mo- 
hammed is  the  apostle  of  Allah."  But  beyond  this  they  could  not  go  ; 
and  the  Christian,  pressed  to  explain  his  creed,  showed  how  Muslim  influ- 
ences and  surroundings  had  influenced  him.  "  What  is  meant  by  the 
Father?"  "That  is  Allah  the  most  exalted."  "And  the  Son;  has 
Allah  a  Son  ? "  To  which  the  reply  came,  "Allah  forbid."  How  easy  it 
would  be  to  show,  on  critical  development  principles,  that  we  have  here 
the  crude  beginnings  of  Christianity  and  Islam  ! 


176  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

simply  contradicts  the  prophet  to  his  face.  There  is  one 
consideration  which  seems  to  be  quite  decisive  on  this 
subject.  Whereas  we  find  proper  names  compounded  with 
the  name  Baal  as  freely  (though  not  as  extensively)  as 
with  the  name  El,  it  is  remarkable  that  we  have  no  in- 
stances of  a  similar  use  of  unequivocal  proper  names  of 
heathen  deities — such  as  Melkart,  Eshmun,  Astarte,  &c.^ 
— which  we  should  certainly  expect  if  the  Israelites 
were  the  polytheists  they  are  made  out  to  be.  There 
is,  in  fact,  no  instance  of  any  name  of  God  being  used 
to  form  proper  names  except  the  names  that  were  appli- 
cable to  their  own  national  God.  "Even  in  the  times," 
says  Noldeke,^  "  which  are  reckoned  those  of  the  worst 
idolatry,  there  does  not  appear  a  single  name  of  a  foreign 
god  in  the  proper  names  of  Israelites — a  proof  that  the 
people,  even  when  they  sacrificed  to  Baal  and  Astarte, 
ever  felt  that  they  were  wrong,  and  that  they  might  never 
denote  themselves  as  worshippers  of  their  deities  by  nam- 
ing themselves  after  them.  That  no  member  of  the  house 
of  Ahab,  which  the  tradition  still  indicates  as  the  most 
idolatrous,  bore  the  name  of  Baal,  and  that,  on  the  con- 
trary, that  king's  son,  by  his  name  Jehoram,  as  well  as  his 
sister  or  daughter  Athaliah,  belonged  to  the  god  of  the 
country,  is  here  significant  enough." 

From  another  quarter  instances  have  lately  been  pointed 
out  of  what  is  alleged  to  have  been  the  employment  by  the 
Israelites  of  names  of  heathen  deities,  without  any  com- 
punction as  to  their  idolatrous  associations,  and  affording 
a  presumption  that  the  pre-prophetic  religion  of  Israel 
was  not  the  pure  Jahavism  which  Biblical  writers  rep- 
resent it  to  be.     Sayce,  in  his  "  Hibbert  Lecture  "  on  the 

1  Baethgen,  Beitriige  zur  Semitischen  Religionsgeschichte,  p.  145. 
-  In  Zeitschrift  der  Deutschen  Morg.  Gesell.,  vol,  xv,  p.  809. 


Sayce  on  Bahyloniaii  Names  of  Deities.  17? 

religion  of  the  ancient  Babylonians,  has  pointed  out  vari- 
ous indications  of  the  contact  of  Babylonian  civilisation 
and  religion  with  those  of  Palestine,  surviving  in  names 
of  places,  such  as  Nebo,  Anu  and  Anatu,  and  Sinai.^  The 
existence  of  such  names,  which  are  names  of  Babylonian 
deities,  attached  to  places  in  Palestine,  is  certainly  signifi- 
cant. The  recent  discovery  of  the  clay  tablets  at  Tell-el- 
Amarna  may,  by  showing  the  early  prevalence  of  Baby- 
lonian influence,  make  the  thing  more  intelligible  :  it  may 
also  tend  to  modify  the  view  which  Sayce  seems  to  hold 
on  the  special  point  before  us.  It  is  this:  Among  the 
Babylonian  deities  whose  names  have  been  recovered 
from  the  inscriptions  is  one  whose  Accadian  name  was 
translated  into  the  Semitic  Eamanu  =  the  exalted  one, 
which  the  Hebrew  writers  have  handed  down  to  us  under 
the  form  Eimmon.  Now  Kimmon  was  the  name  of  the 
supreme  god  of  the  Syrians  of  Damascus,  and  was  there 
identified  with  the  sun-god  Hadad.^  The  name,  he  says, 
made  its  way  to  the  non-Semitic  tribes  of  the  Taurus,  and 
to  Edom,  and  "  like  Hadad  of  Edom,  David  of  Israel  will 
thus  have  borne  a  name  which  the  people  about  him  ap- 
plied to  their  sovereign  god."  Elsewhere^  he  explains 
that  Hadad,  the  supreme  Baal  or  sun-god,  whose  worship 
extended  from  Carchemish  to  Edom  and  Palestine,  is 
spoken  of  by  Shalmaneser  under  the  abbreviated  name  of 
Dada,  as  a  name  current  in  the  north ;  and  that  in  the 
south  the  name  was  confounded  with  the  Semitic  word 
which  appears  in  Assyrian  as  dadu,  "  dear  little  child." 
This  is  the  word,  he  says,  which  we  have  in  Be-dad  or 
Bendad,  the  father  of  the  Edomite  Hadad ;  we  have  it  also 
in  the  David  of  the  Old  Testament,  David  or  Dod  being 

1  Hibbert  Lecture,  p.  42.  2  i^^^  ^  p   202  ff. 

3  Ibid.,  p.  55  ff.     Cf.  Modern  Review,  Jan.  1884.  ^^^L^    >.    ^-^ 


ijirivBi 


178  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

the  masculine  of  the  feminine  form  Dido.  Thus,  accord- 
ing to  Sayce,  the  names  of  Dodo  and  David  point  to 
a  worship  of  the  sun-god  under  the  title  of  the  "  beloved 
one "  in  southern  Canaan  as  well  as  in  Phoenicia.  This 
he  thinks  is  confirmed  by  the  new  reading  of  the  Moabite 
Stone  by  Socin  and  Smend,  which  would  show  that  the 
northern  Israelites  worshipped  a  Dodo  or  Dod  by  the  side 
of  Jahaveh,  or  rather  adored  the  supreme  God  under  the 
name  of  Dod  (nin)  as  well  as  under  that  of  Jahaveh. 
According  to  this  reading  of  the  inscription,  Mesha  says 
that  he  carried  away  the  arel  (or  altar)  of  Dodo  from 
Ataroth  and  dragged  it  before  Chemosh,  and  from  Nebo 
the  arels  of  Jahaveh,  which  he  likewise  dragged  before 
Chemosh.  It  is  suggested  that  Dod  or  Dodo  was  an  old 
title  of  the  supreme  God  in  the  Jebusite  Jerusalem,  and 
that  this  explains  the  word  Dodi  ("  my  beloved  ")  in  the 
brief  song  in  Isa.  v.  We  can  easily  understand,  he  con- 
cludes, how  a  name  of  this  kind,  with  such  a  signification, 
should  have  been  transferred  by  popular  affection  from 
the  deity,  to  the  king  of  whom  it  is  said  that  "  all  Israel 
and  Judah  loved  him  "  (1  Sam.  xviii.  16).^ 

What  Sayce  maintains  is,  that  the  name  David,  as 
also  the  names  Saul  arid  Solomon,^  were  not  names 
given  in  childhood,  but  were  subsequently  applied.  This 
is  actually  stated  in  regard  to  Solomon  (2  Sam.  xii.  24, 

^  As  long  ago  as  1842  Daumer  explained  the  name  David,  "beloved 
one,"  as  properly  a  name  of  the  god  after  whom  the  Moloch- worshipping 
king  called  himself.  And  in  keeping  with  the  idea  that  the  victim  offered 
to  Moloch  was  regarded  as  his  bride,  he  explains  the  names  Hebron, 
I^jath  Arba,  where  David  reigned,  as  derived  from  Tiaber,  a  companion, 
lover,  and  raba,  to  lie  down.  In  the  same  connection  Og,  king  of  Bashan, 
is  explained  as  a  fiery  oven,  and  his  famous  bedstead  as  the  iron  bed  on 
which  the  victims  were  laid. — Feuer  und  Molochdienst  der  alteu  Hebraer, 
p.  99  f. 

2  Hibbert  Lecture,  pp.  51,  52. 


Nanus  of  Saul,  Solomon,  Moses.  179 

25),  as  to  David,  he  inclines  to  the  view  of  those  critics 
who  maintain  that  his  name  originally  was  El-hanan  or 
Baal-hanan,  and  that  in  2  Sam.  xxi.  19,  xxiii.  24,  we 
ought  to  read  "Elhanan  who  is  Dodo"  or  David.  Saul 
too,  he  says,  is  a  secondary  name,  meaning  in  Hebrew 
the  one  asked  for  by  the  people ;  but  it  really  was  the  name 
of  a  Babylonian  deity,  Savul  or  Sawul,^  transported  to 
Edom,  and  perhaps  also  to  Palestine.  Solomon  also  is 
a  divine  name,  the  cuneiform  inscriptions  informing 
us  that  Sallimmanu,  "  the  god  of  peace,"  was  a  god 
honoured  particularly  in  Assyria,  where  the  name  of 
more  than  one  king  (Shalman-eser)  was  compounded 
with  it. 

Similarly,  Sayce  claims  thut  the  name  of  Moses  ^  is  not 
derived  from  the  language  of  Egypt,  but  from  Masu,  an 
older  form  of  Semitic  than  that  preserved  in  the  Old 
Testament — i.e.,  the  Assyrian.  The  word  means  "hero," 
and  is  applied  to  more  than  one  deity,  particularly  to 
Adar,  a  form  of  the  sun  -  god,  and  to  Merodach,  the 
tutelar  god  of  Babylon,  and  Nergal,  the  sun  of  night. 
It  also  signifies  "collector  of  books."  In  the  sense  of 
"hero"  it  made  its  way  into  astrology,  and  Masu,  the 
hero  of  astronomers,  must  have  been  the  sun-god.  It  is 
not  more  strange,  he  continues,  that  a  name  thus  inti- 
mately associated  with  the  religious  and  astrological  be- 
liefs of  Babylonia  should  have  found  its  way  west,  than 
that  names  like  Nebo  (where  JMoses  died),  in  sight  of  the 
"  moon  city  "  Jericho,  and  Sin,  which  last  we  know,  from 
a  Himyaritic  inscription,  had  been  carried  south  into 
Arabia,  should  have  been  so  transported.  It  may  have 
been  carried  north  as  well,  and  perhaps  the  wilderness 
of  Sin  is  a  trace  of  it ;  and  tlierefore  a  shriue  may  have 

'  Hibbert  Lecture,  p.  54.  2  i\y{^^^  p   43  fj-. 


180  Naming  vf  the  Deity. 

existed  on  Sinai  before  the  Israelites  begged  to  be  allowed 
to  go  a  three  days'  journey  to  it. 

Once  more,  the  name  Joseph,  which,  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, is  variously  derived  from  Hebrew  roots,^  is  the 
name  of  a  deity  that  was  worshipped  by  the  older  in- 
habitants of  Canaan.  Thothmes  III.,  more  than  two 
centuries  before  the  date  given  by  Egyptologists  for  the 
exodus,  mentions  on  the  walls  of  Karnak  the  names  of 
cities  captured  by  him  in  Palestine,  among  which  are 
Yaqab-el  (Jacob  the  god)  and  Iseph-el  ("Joseph  the 
god").  Therefore,  he  says,  we  are  tempted  to  think 
that  "the  house  of  Joseph"  may  have  belonged  to  an 
earlier  period  than  that  in  which  it  was  applied  to  the 
tribes  of  Ephraim  and  Manasseh,  and  that  perhaps  "  the 
house  of  Joseph  "  was  simply  "  Beth-el."  For  in  Assyrian, 
asipu  or  asip  is  =  diviner,  and  the  phrase  "  house  of  the 
oracle "  is  actually  met  with.  Therefore,  though  not 
proved,  it  is  probable  that  Joseph  was  originally  equal 
to  the  Babylonian  asipu,  "the  god  of  the  oracle,"  and 
that  long  before  the  Israelitish  house  of  Joseph  took 
possession  of  Luz,  it  had  been  a  house  of  Joseph  in 
another  sense,  and  the  sanctuary  of  a  Canaanitisli  oracle. 

Now  what  is  the  bearing  of  all  this  on  the  subject 
before  us  ?  The  facts  adduced  would  seem  to  show  that 
not  only  names  of  places  in  Palestine  and  the  west  bore 
names  which  were  also  the  names  of  Assyrian  deities, 
but  that  even  the  names  of  individuals  placed  by  the 
Biblical  writers  in  the  time  of  the  Jahaveh  religion,  came 
originally  from  the  same  source ;'  and,  as  Sayce  would 
lead  us  to  infer,  were  knowingly  bestowed  upon  them 
with  a  reference  to  the  deities  so  named.  The  conclu- 
sion  would   be   that    at   the    time,    say,   of   David    and 

'  Hibbert  Lecture,  p.  49  f. 


Appellative  Names.  181 

Solomon,  not  to  speak  of  earlier  times,  the  recognition 
of  Jabaveli  as  the  only  God  of  the  Israelites  was  not  so 
strong  as  to  prevent  the  free  use  of  the  names  of  other 
deities  beside  Him ;  or,  at  all  events,  it  did  not  preclude 
the  naming  of  Him  by  the  names  of  other  gods. 

There  are,  however,  several  circumstances  to  be  taken 
into  account  which  will,  if  I  mistake  not,  greatly  modify 
such  a  conclusion.  It  will  be  observed,  in  the  first  place, 
that  the  names  upon  which  this  argument  is  founded  are 
originally  appellative  names  in  Assyrian :  D^d,  the  exalted 
one;  Sallimmanu,  the  peaceful  one;  Masu,  lord;  Asip, 
diviner;  and  so  forth.  Some  of  them,  as  Sallimmanu 
and  Asip,^  are  found  also  as  common  appellative  names 
in  Hebrew  with  the  same  sense ;  and  Dad  has  been  shown 
by  Sayce  himself  to  be  capable  of  connection  with  the 
Hebrew  stem  meaning  to  love.  Then,  further,  we  are  to 
remember  the  manner  in  which,  and  the  extent  to  which, 
the  Semitic  inhabitants  of  Assyria  bestowed  names  upon 
their  gods.  The  words  of  Sayce,  in  another  part  of  his 
Hibbert  Lectures,^  are  necessary  here  in  order  to  give  us 
some  idea  of  the  mythology  of  the  polytheistic  Semitic 
peoples : — 

"  Around  the  three  chief  gods,"  he  says,  "  were  grouped  the  mul- 
titudinous deities  which  Accadian  superstition  or  Semitic  piety  had 
invented  or  dreamed  of.  Assur  -  natsir  -  pal  declares  that  there 
were  *  65,000  great  gods  of  heaven  and  earth ' ;  and  though  we 
may  doubt  whether  the  Assyrian  king  was  not  indulging  in  a  little 
royal  exaggeration,  it  is  certain  that  the  task  of  enumerating  them 
all  would  have  exhausted  the  most  indefatigable  of  priestly  scribes. 
Besides  the  numberless  minor  deities  of  the  towns  and  villages, 
there  were  the  divine  titles  out  of  which  new  gods  had  been 
evolved  ;  divinities  which  owed  their  existence  to  the  linguistic  or 
literary  errors  of  the  Semites  ;  and  finally,  foreign  gods  like  Kiltum 


5]B>fc5     See  Sayce,  Hibbert  Lecture,  p.  50  f.  -  Ibid.,  p.  215  ff. 


182  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

and  Sumaliya  of  the  Kossseans,  or  Lagarmai  of  Susa.  .  .  .  When 
we  remember  how  the  background  of  the  vast  pantheon  was  filled 
with  the  obscure  deities  and  spirits  of  the  ancient  Accadian  cult, 
whose  names  survived  in  magical  charms  and  exorcisms,  while  the 
air  above  was  occupied  by  the  *  300  spirits  of  heaven,'  and  the  earth 
below  by  the  '  600  spirits  of  earth,'  we  begin  to  realise  the  force  of 
the  expression  which  made  the  supreme  gods  rulers  of  the  legions  of 
earth  and  sky.  Bil  Kissat,  '  tlie  lord  of  hosts,'  was  a  phrase  full  of 
significance  to  tbe  believing  Babylonian."^ 

We  thus  see  that  the  ancient  Babylonians,  like  the 
Aryan  nations,  in  order  to  denote  forces  operative  behind 
observed  phenomena,  employed  names  expressing  the 
agency  or  operation,  and  whether  or  not  these  were  origin- 
ally applied  to  one  supreme  power,  they  became  personi- 
fications of  individual  forces  or  names  of  superhuman 
beings ;  but  the  names  themselves  had  primarily  a  simple 
enough  and  harmless  enough  signification.  As  to  the 
existence  of  such  Assyrian  names  in  the  Hebrew  writings, 
Sayce  points  out  that  there  were  two  periods  at  which 
we  may  assume  an  active  contact  with  the  Semitic  thought 
of  Assyria  and  that  of  Palestine,  either  early  at  the 
time  of  the  immigration  of  the  Abrahamic  tribes  from 
Ur  of  the  Chaldees,  or  later  on  during  the  encroachments 
of  the  Assyrians  westward,  or  even  during  the  captivity 
in  Babylon.2  If  we  go  back  to  the  earliest  of  these  times 
for  the  influence  of  Babylonian  religion  on  the  west, 
there  will  be  nothing  extraordinary  in  the  prevalence  of 
Assyrian  names  of  places,  or  even  the  existence  of  proper 
names  of  persons  corresponding  to  Babylonian  names; 
for  the  Biblical  writers  place  the  beginnings  of  the 
distinctive  monotheism  of  the  Hebrews  at  the  time  of 
Abraham's  immigration,  and  declare  that  the  fathers  of 
the  patriarch   served  otlier  gods  beyond  the  river.      To 

1  See  Note  XVI.  2  Hibbert  Lecture,  p.  43. 


Babylonian  Influence  on  Palestine.  183 

place  the  introduction  of  such  names  as  have  been  ad- 
duced at  either  of  the  later  points  of  contact  is  surely 
too  late  for  the  purposes  of  the  argument.  For  though 
it  may  be  conceivable  that  legends  or  beliefs,  such  as  are 
found  in  the  earliest  chapters  of  Genesis,  may  have  been 
taken  over  from  the  Assyrians  or  Babylonians  as  late  as 
the  captivity,  it  is  hardly  conceivable  that  the  names  of 
David,  Solomon,  and  Saul,  not  to  say  those  of  Joseph 
and  Moses,  got  into  the  Hebrew  language  at  that  time, 
or  even  so  comparatively  early  as  the  time  at  which  the 
Assyrians  as  a  conquering  power  first  came  upon  the 
horizon  of  the  Israelites,  about  the  ninth  century  B.C. 
We  are  therefore  entitled  to  recognise  the  stems  from 
which  the  names  in  question  are  derived  as  part  of  the 
linguistic  stock  of  the  Hebrews,  which  they  had  in  com- 
mon with  their  Semitic  brethren  in  Assyria,  and  which 
they  used  and  developed  in  their  own  way.  If  they 
were  simple  appellative  terms  at  first,  there  is  no  reason 
why  they  should  not  have  remained  so  in  the  hands  of 
the  Hebrews,  but  every  reason  to  believe  that  they  did. 
For  this  is  just  the  distinctive  peculiarity  of  the  course 
which  the  development  of  Israel's  religion  followed — that 
whereas  the  heathen  Semitic  nations  ran  off  into  myth- 
ology, the  Hebrews  retained  the  primary  sense  of  words, 
and  were  not  led  into  the  deification  of  mere  qualities. 
The  orthodox  Mohammedans,  to  give  an  illustration  of 
what  I  mean,  have  a  list  of  ninety-nine  excellent  names 
by  which  they  designate  their  god;  and  as  they  recite 
these  one  by  one,  telling  a  bead  on  a  rosary  with  the 
utterance  of  each  name,  they  never  for  a  moment  regard 
each  as  the  name  of  a  distinct  deity ;  for  as  they  tell  the 
hundredth  bead,  they  repeat  the  name  of  the  One  of 
whom  all  the  other  names  are  mere  attributes — Allah  I 


184  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

This  is  an  illustration  of  how  the  strong  monotheistic 
instinct  preserves  itself  safe  from  the  influence  of  names. 
No  one  thinks  of  saying  that  when  one  man  is  named 
Abd-ul-Kereem,  and  another  Abd-ul-Majeed,  or  a  woman 
is  named  Kereemeh,  Jameeleh,  and  so  forth,  the  words 
Kereem  and  Majeed,  &c.,  are  names  of  distinct  Muslim 
deities  with  female  consorts ;  they  remain  mere  adjectives 
expressing  different  qualities — generous,  glorious — ascribed 
to  the  one  God.  Given  the  polytheistic  bent,  however, 
such  names  as  these  become  raised  to  the  rank  of  entities 
and  deities,  and  so  the  Assyrian  pantheon  reached  its 
immense  proportions ;  for  every  quality  that  could  be 
assigned  to  a  god,  or  to  the  supreme  God,  takes  its  place 
as  one  of  the  gods  many. 

Now,  when  we  remember  the  close  resemblance  be- 
tween all  the  Semitic  branches  of  language,  is  there  any- 
thing remarkable  in  the  fact  that  out  of  the  extensive 
treasury  of  vocables  that  might  thus  become  names  of 
Assyrian  deities,  a  very  considerable  number  should  co- 
incide with  Hebrew  proper  names  ?  Why,  if  a  volley 
were  fired  at  random  from  the  65,000  (or  even  much 
smaller  number  of)  names  ascribed  to  the  gods,  I  suppose 
that  scarcely  a  vocable  in  the  poor  Hebrew  language, 
noun,  verb,  or  particle,  would  escape  deification.  That  for 
such  a  common  stem  as  that  lying  at  the  root  of  Solo- 
mon's name  (the  common  Semitic  word  for  peace),  we 
should  have  to  go  to  the  name  of  an  Assyrian  deity — 
when  these  were  so  easily  manufactured — seems  a  refine- 
ment of  ingenuity  that  defeats  its  own  end.  For  no 
Hebrew,  on  this  mode  of  reasoning,  would  be  safe  to  use 
a  single  word  of  his  language  without  committing  himself 
to  polytheistic  notions.  If,  for  example,  the  name  of 
Moses  simply  means  lord  or  hero,  and   was  applied  to 


Argument  from  Names  misleading.  185 

many  gods,  the  most  that  can  be  inferred  from  its  pres- 
ence in  Hebrew  is,  that  a  root  which  is  no  longer  found 
in  Hebrew  goes  back  to  an  old  common  Semitic  origin, 
and  may  have  been  used  like  haal  as  a  quite  harmless 
word.  A  very  significant  circumstance  is  that  this  sup- 
posed mode  of  giving  names  is  not  in  keeping  with  the 
Hebrew  and  general  Semitic  custom,  according  to  which 
the  proper  names  of  this  class  are  compounded  with  some 
name  of  deity,  but  are  not,  as  this  supposition  requires, 
the  actual  names  of  the  gods.^  In  view  of  this  remark- 
able difference,  and  the  fact  that  these  names  can  all  be 
explained  in  a  simpler  manner  without  going  so  far  afield, 
I  am  brought  to  the  conclusion  that  there  is  nothing  in 
the  argument  beyond  the  wealth  of  learning  with  which 
it  is  maintained. 

But  in  truth,  this  mode  of  arguing  from  names,  apart 
from  the  historical  circumstances,  is  quite  misleading,  and 
might  be  employed  to  prove  the  most  absurd  positions  if 
applied  to  modern  names.  Yet  it  is  just  one  of  those 
arguments  which  have  a  glamour  of  something  deep  and 
recondite  about  them,  and  lead  people  to  say  "  There  is 
something  in  them."  The  thing  regarding  which  we 
want  information  is  not  proved,  and  cannot  be  proved 
on  this  line  of  reasoning — viz.,  whether  or  not  David's 
parents  or  his  countrymen  by  the  term  Dad  under- 
stood a  heathen  god  who  at  that  time  was  reverenced 
by  neighbouring  peoples,  and  gave  him  the  name  in 
honour  of  that  deity ;  or  whether  they  called  their  own 
God  Jahaveh  by  that  name.     The  only  attempt  at  his- 

*  If  there  are  exceptions  to  the  rule  they  are  very  rare.  Baethgen 
inentiona  Anath  found  as  a  personal  name,  and  perhaps  also  a  name  of 
deity  in  the  expression  Beth  Anath. — Beitriige  zur  Semitischen  Ke- 
ligionsgeschichte,  p.  141. 


186  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

torical  proof  of  this  given  by  Sayce  is  the  doubtful  inter- 
pretation of  an  obscure  phrase  on  the  Moabite  Stone. 
For  the  rest,  his  argument  might  as  well  prove  that  we 
still  believe  in  the  old  Scandinavian  gods  because  we 
name  the  days  of  the  week  from  those  deities ;  or  that, 
for  example,  the  existence  of  a  family  of  the  name  of 
King  in  the  United  States,  would  show  that  the  people 
of  that  country  had  a  monarchical  government;  or  that 
Isidore,  the  bishop  of  Seville,  was  a  worshipper  of  Isis ; 
or  the  Numidian  bishop  Asmunius  was  a  worshipper  of 
or  named  after  the  god  Eshmun.^ 

The  particulars  we  have  been  considering  are  but  parts 
of  a  very  wide  subject,  to  which  I  can  only  briefly  allude — 
the  mythological  treatment  of  the  Old  Testament.  Some 
have  carried  this  mode  of  viewing  the  materials  to  such 
an  extent  as  to  find  the  whole  cycle  of  the  Aryan  Sun 
mythology  in  the  stories  of  the  patriarchs  and  the  judges.^ 
It  seems  to  me  that  to  identify  proper  names  like  those 
of  David  and  Solomon  with  Assyrian  names  of  deities,  is 
but  part  of  the  same  mode  of  reasoning;  and  that  the 
explanation  of  the  phenomena  which  are  made  to  lend 
countenance  to  the  view  in  either  case  is  the  same  as  I 
have  hinted  at.  A  language  has  a  number  of  primary 
words  denoting  certain  simple  conceptions ;  and  using 
these,  it  gives  names  to  persons  and  to  things  cognisable 
by  the  senses,  or  intuitively  perceived,  or  inferred  by  the 
reason.  But  if  we  find  the  same  name  applied  to  a  visible 
and  to  an  invisible  thing,  are  we  to  conclude  that  it  was 
first  given  to  the  invisible  and  then  borrowed  for  the 
visible  ?  This  would  be  a  most  extraordinary  freak  of  lan- 
guage and  of  thought.  To  keep  to  the  examples  we  have 
had.     If  we  find  tliat  haal  is  the  common  name  for  lord 

'  Baethgen,  Beitrage,  p.  141.  -  See  Note  XVTT, 


Mythological  Treatment  of  Old  Testament.  187 

or  husband,  but  is  also  used  of  the  deity,  are  we  to  sup- 
pose that  a  husband  of  a  wife  and  the  owner  of  an  ox  were 
so  called  because  beforehand  men  had  applied  the  name 
Baal  to  the  unseen  power  or  powers  behind  nature  ?  Or 
because  the  name  adon  is  found  in  Hebrew  meaning 
master,  and  is  also  applied  to  the  Lord,  are  we  to  suppose 
that  earthly  masters  were  so  named  because  the  mind  had 
first  arrived  at  the  conclusion  that  there  was  a  Master 
and  Lord  of  Creation  ?  Or  again,  if  Molech  (=  ruler)  is 
the  name  of  any  king,  and  also  of  a  god  of  a  people,  are 
we  to  assume  that  all  who  called  their  kings  by  this  name 
named  them  after  the  god  ?  Further,  if  two  kindred 
Semitic  branches  start  with  a  common  stock  (so  far  as  it 
goes)  of  such  primary  words,  and  we  find  that  one  branch 
ran  into  mythology,  and  instead  of  retaining  the  primary 
senses  of  their  words,  allowed  them  to  become  personi- 
fications, are  we  to  conclude  tliat  another  branch,  which 
in  clear  historical  times  shows  the  widest  divergence  in 
its  modes  of  conception,  is  to  be  held  committed,  in  the 
use  of  the  primary  words,  to  the  secondary  application  of 
them  made  by  the  kindred  stock  ?  When  put  in  this  way, 
I  think  that  the  precariousness  (to  say  the  least)  of  the 
mythological  argument  will  appear.  I  do  not  think  it 
is  likely  that  a  people  first  found  names  for  a  host  of 
unseen  beings  or  forces,  before  giving  names  to  themselves 
and  things  around  them  (the  very  usage  in  Assyrian 
shows  that  the  reverse  was  the  case) ;  and  if  in  giving 
these  names  they  employed  the  only  materials  their 
language  furnished,  it  need  not  be  surprising  if  gods  and 
men  and  trees  got  finally  the  same  or  similar  names.  If 
the  idea  of  strong  attaches  to  the  word  el,  and  if  a  cer- 
tain kind  of  tree  is  called  "a  strong  thing,''  and  the 
deity  or  nature  spirit  is  called  "  the  strong  one,"  we  are 


188  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

not  to  jump  to  the  conclusion  that  the  tree  was  so  named 
because  a  deity  resided  in  it.  But  this  is  actually  the 
view,  as  we  shall  see,  that  Stade  takes  in  regard  to 
this  word ;  though  such  reasoning  can  only  lead  to  mys- 
tification, as  may  be  shown  by  another  example.  There 
is  a  word  in  Hebrew,  Abir  O""?^),  meaning  "mighty" 
or  "strong,"  and  it  is  used  as  a  name  of  God  in  the 
expressions  "  Mighty  One  of  Israel "  or  "  of  Jacob."  A 
slightly  different  form  of  the  word,  Abbir  (y^^),  is 
used  as  a  name  of  the  ox ;  it  is  applied  also  to  the  horse, 
as  also  to  princes,  and  is  used  in  the  general  sense 
of  "strong."  Now  this  word  is  so  temptingly  like  the 
name  of  Apis,  the  Egyptian  bull  god  (being,  as  has  just 
been  said,  also  applied  to  the  bull),  that  mythologists 
have  found  it  sufficient  to  hang  an  argument  upon,  to 
the  effect  that  the  calf-worship  was  originally  part  of 
the  genuine  Jahaveh  religion,  and  that  traces  of  the  fact 
remain  in  the  application  of  the  very  name  of  Apis  to 
Jahaveh  Himself.  This  is  but  a  specimen  of  the  kind  of 
argument  that  perplexes  those  who  do  not  look  narrowly 
into  the  state  of  the  matter;  which  simply  resolves  itself 
into  this,  that  the  idea  of  strength  was  naturally  applied 
to  the  ox,  or  the  horse,  or  a  prince,  and  just  as  naturally 
attributed  to  God.  It  would  be  quite  possible,  on  this 
mode  of  reasoning,  to  make  heathen  gods  out  of  many  of 
the  words  that  we  employ  in  daily  speech. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  Hebrew  literature  is  sin- 
gularly free  from  mythological  ideas  such  as  we  find 
in  other  early  literatures.  With  a  highly  poetic  mode 
of  conception,  metaphors  of  the  boldest  kind  and  the 
freest  personifications  were  not  only  possible,  but  were 
freely  employed.  Yet  the  writers  of  the  Old  Testament 
do  not  allow  themselves   to  be   carried  away  by   their 


Semitic  Monotheism.  189 

words.  The  thing  personified  remains  the  thing  all  the 
time,  though  fields  clap  hands,  and  floods  lift  up  their 
voices,  and  trees  rejoice ;  and  as  it  would  be  quite  unfair 
to  take  such  modtis  of  expression  as  proofs  that  originally 
the  fields  and  floods  and  trees  were  endowed  with  person- 
ality, so  it  is  unfair  to  press  such  common  appellative 
names  as  we  have  been  considering  into  the  service  of  a 
theory  of  mythology. 

M.  Eenan,  indeed,  who  is  inclined  to  ascribe  an  in- 
herent tendency  to  monotheism  to  all  the  Semitic  races, 
or  at  least  to  the  nomad  sections  of  them,  says  that  the 
attributing  of  life  to  words  is  the  cause  of  mythology,  and 
that  the  Semitic  languages  do  not  lend  themselves  much 
to  these  kinds  of  personification.^  But  the  fact  remains 
that  otlier  branches  of  the  Semitic  family  ran  into 
mythology,  while  the  Hebrew  race  alone  was  preserved 
from  it.  The  Semitic  names  El,  Baal,  &c.,  says  Baudis- 
sin,2  we  judge  to  be  different  from  the  Aryan  names  not 
so  much  on  account  of  the  different  genius  of  the  Semitic 
language,  as  on  account  of  the  different  conception  formed 
of  the  deity.  And  Andrew  Lang  observes  truly  that  it  is 
a  certain  condition  of  thouc^ht,  a  certain  habit  of  mind,  and 
not  a  disease  of  this  or  that  language,  that  is  the  cause  of 
mythology.  "  It  is  just  as  easy,"  he  says,  "  to  say  heaven 
is  a  lover,  earth  his  wife,  in  a  language  where  heaven  is 
Sarnd  and  earth  is  Ars,  as  in  a  language  where  heaven 
is  Uranus  and  earth  is  Gaea,  as  in  Greek,  or  where  heaven 
is  Rangi  and  earth  is  Papa,  as  in  New  Zealand."  The 
same  writer,  after  pointing  out  the  insufficiency  of  the 
various  explanations  that  have  been  given  of  the  so-called 
myths  of  the  Old  Testament,  and  the  essential  and  striking 

^  Hist,  du  peuple  d'Israel,  i.  p.  46. 
2  Jahve  et  Moloch,  p.  10. 


1 90  Naming  of  the  Deity. 

differences  to  be  perceived  between  them  and  the  myths 
of  kindred  or  similarly  situated  peoples,  concludes :  "  The 
whole  question  may  be  insoluble,  but  is  eternally  attrac- 
tive. Behind  it  all  is  the  mystery  of  race  and  of  selection. 
It  is  an  ultimate  fact  in  the  history  and  government  of 
the  world,  this  eminent  genius  of  one  tiny  people  for 
religion.  We  know  no  more;  and  in  M.  Eenan's  own 
terms,  the  people  was  *  selected,'  just  as,  in  words  more 
familiar,  Israel  is  *  the  chosen  people.'  "  ^ 

In  conclusion,  it  seems  to  me  that  this  reasoning  from 
names  proves  either  by  far  too  much  for  the  theory,  or 
proves  nothing  at  all  to  the  argument  in  hand.  If  we  are 
to  infer  from  every  Hebrew  proper  name  which  may  cor- 
respond etymologically  with  some  god-name  of  a  foreign 
people,  that  the  Israelites  at  the  time  they  named  their 
children  in  this  manner  believed  in  or  gave  reverence  to 
these  heathen  gods,  we  manifestly  prove  too  much,  for 
there  are  far  too  many  of  these  names,  and  at  the  time 
at  which  they  are  found  we  are  in  the  light  of  history,  and 
yet  find  no  other  proofs  of  recognition  of  such  deities. 
Or  if  it  is  merely  argued  that  the  presence  of  such 
names  among  the  Hebrews  proves  that  "  originally "  the 
Hebrews  believed  in  all  these  deities,  the  answer  to  the 
argument  is  twofold, — (a)  that  we  do  not  know  what  is 
meant  by  "originally,"  and  (h)  that  the  so-called  original 
belief  may  resolve  itself  into  a  necessary  imperfection  of 
language,  whereby  metaphor  was  employed,  it  might  have 
been  innocently  enough,  by  the  Israelite  forefathers.  We 
have  seen,  from  this  mode  of  mythological  reasoning, 
enough  to  convince  any  fair-minded  person  how  very 
vague  and  precarious  are  the  conclusions  to  which  it  may 
be  made  to  lead.     Vague,  because  the  argument  does  not 

1  The  New  Review,  No.  3,  August  1889. 


Argument  proves  too  much  or  Nothing.  191 

undertake  to  show  the  precise  historical  periods  at  which 
the  mythological  conceptions  prevailed,  but  hints  at 
"  original "  usages,  and  faded  myths,  and  so  forth.  And 
precarious,  because  the  unwary  reader  is  apt  to  conclude 
that  every  so-called  mythological  expression  is  an  indica- 
tion of  a  mythological  belief  on  the  part  of  the  writer 
employing  it,  which  certainly  cannot  be  proved. 


192 


CHAPTEE    Vlll. 

PEE-PROPHETIO  RELIGION  CONTINUED — THE  DWELLING-PLACE 
OF  THE  DEITY. 


The  critical  position  that  Israel's  God  had  His  original  dwelUnrj  on  Sinai, 
or  was  limited  to  Canaan — Deborah's  song — David  driven  out  from 
the  presence  of  the  Lord — The  wider  reference  of  the  argument — Associa- 
tion of  Jahaveh  with  the  sanctuaries  of  the  land :  His  dwelling  in  the 
ark — In  short,  the  worship  of  pre-prophetic  Israel  ivas  that  of  the  high 
places ;  and  this,  according  to  Stade,  arose  from  the  veneration  paid 
to  graves  of  ancestors — The  view  said  to  be  confirmed  by  the  veneration 
paid  to  trees,  stones,  &c.,  pointing  to  original  fetish-worship — This  part 
of  the  theory  examined — Remxtrh  on  the  use  made  of  documents  in  this 
argument — Confusion  of  Stade's  argument  ;  reasoning  from  history  of 
other  nations  is  begging  the  question  ;  and  for  the  rest,  the  argument  is 
mainly  based  on  a  forced  interpretation  of  metaphorical  language— Pop- 
ular superstition  must  be  admitted  everywhere,  but  its  existence  is  no 
proof  of  the  non-existence  of  a  pure  faith — A  nature-God  and  a  God  oj 
nature — A  sure  method  of  testing  this  precarious  mode  of  reasoning  ; 
check  metaphorical  language  by  unambiguous  expressions  in  the  same 
composition,  and  appeal  to  books  of  earliest  writing  pi'ophets. 

A  FAVOURITE  line  of  argument  to  prove  the  low  tone  of 
the  pre-prophetic  religion  is,  that  the  God  of  the  Hebrews 
was  regarded  by  them  as  confined  to,  or  inseparably  linked 
to,  their  native  land,  just  as  the  gods  of  the  nations  were 
the  patrons  and  defenders  of  their  territories. 

Palestine,  we  are  told,  was  not  indeed  the  original  seat  of 
Jahaveh,  as  it  was  not  the  original  home  of  Israel.    His  ori- 


^  IVBE3iT 


Sinai  Jahaveh^s  Dwelling-place, 

ginal  abode  was  Mount  Sinai,  a  mountain  sacred  of  old  time 
among  Semitic  peoples,  from  which  He  came  with  Israel 
when  they  emerged  from  the  desert,  fighting  at  the  head 
of  their  armies  till  they  subdued  Canaan,  and  returning 
again  to  His  ancient  seat  when  the  war  was  over.  Tliis 
is  proved,  as  it  is  maintained,  by  the  song  of  Deborah, 
one  of  the  oldest  compositions  that  have  come  down  to 
us,^  in  which,  in  Wellhausen's  words,  Jahaveh  "  is  sum- 
moned to  come  from  Sinai  to  succour  His  oppressed  peo- 
ple, and  to  place  Himself  at  the  head  of  His  warriors."  ^ 
Let  us  try  to  picture  to  ourselves  the  situation  which  is 
here  set  before  us.  In  a  time  of  sore  straits,  when  the 
tribes  of  Israel  come  to  deadly  grips  with  the  armies  of 
Sisera,  in  the  north  of  Palestine,  they  find  themselves 
with  nothing  but  tlieir  own  arms  to  rely  upon.  The  only 
assurance  of  divine  presence  they  have  is  the  ark,  the 
symbol  or  representation  of  Jahaveh,  who  continued  to 
dwell  on  Sinai  long  after  the  Israelites  had  settled  in 
Palestine.^  They  long  for  the  direct  help  of  their  God. 
They  summon  Him,  and  He  comes  to  their  aid.  What 
does  all  this  mean  ?  If  they  prayed  to  Him  to  come,  they 
have  already  a  pretty  advanced  idea  of  the  power  of  a 
God  so  far  distant  to  hear  them  and  to  interfere  on  their 
behalf.  The  truth  is,  the  song  says  not  a  word  of  Jahaveh 
being  "summoned"  from  Sinai  on  the  occasion  of  the 
battle  referred  to.  The  only  show  of  support  for  such 
an  idea  is  to  be  found  in  an  obscure  expression  in  verse 

^  It  is  not  safe,  hoAvever,  in  these  days,  to  assert  anything  as  undisputed 
in  regard  to  the  dates  of  Hebrew  documents  ;  for  quite  recently  we  have 
been  told  that  this  song  of  Deborah,  which  "has  been  believed  to  be 
ancient,  is,  on  the  contrary,  of  very  late  date,  and  consequently  unworthy 
of  credence." — Maurice  Vernes,  Les  Rc'sultats  de  I'Exdgese  Biblique,  p.  21. 

^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  344.  3  i\^i^^ 

N 


194  TJie  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity. 

13,  which  may  be  rendered,  "  Then  a  remnant  of  nobles 
(and  of)  the  people  did  go  down ;  the  Lord  went  down 
to  my  help  among  the  mighty  "  (Queen's  Printer's  Bible). 
As  for  the  expressions  near  the  beginning  of  the  song 
(vv.  4,  5),  they  have  no  reference  to  Jahaveh  being 
"summoned"  from  Sinai,  but  consist  of  a  highly  poetic 
di^scription,  to  be  placed  side  by  side  with  the  similar 
language  in  Ps.  Ixviii.  7,  8,  of  the  manifestation  of  Jaha- 
veh at  Sinai.  All  such  highly  figurative  expressions 
are  most  naturally  to  be  understood  as  referring  to  the 
extraordinary  transactions,  in  whatever  sense  we  may 
understand  them,  that  all  tradition  places  in  the  time  im- 
mediately succeeding  the  exodus — transactions  to  which 
the  heart  of  the  people  would  turn  in  every  time  of  dan- 
ger to  give  them  trust  in  their  covenant  God.  Nay,  the 
expressions  are  such  that  Bertheau,  in  his  commentary  on 
the  passage,  concludes  that  Jahaveh's  seat  is  to  be  under- 
stood, according  to  the  popular  belief  which  here  finds 
utterance,  not  on  Sinai,  but  on  some  mountain  to  the 
north  or  east  of  Palestine, — for  it  is  said,  "When  Thou 
wentest  forth  out  of  Seir,  when  Thou  marchedst  out  of  the 
field  of  Edom,  the  earth  trembled,  .  .  .  even  yon  Sinai, 
at  the  presence  of  the  Lord,  the  God  of  Israel."  From 
this  he  reasons  that  the  original  abode  of  Jahaveh — in 
the  popular  conception  —  was  elsewhere,  and  that  the 
verses  describe  His  removal  to  meet  Israel  as  they  came 
out  of  Egypt.  However  this  may  be,  even  if  we  admit 
that  the  popular  conception  embodied  in  the  song  made 
Sinai  His  peculiar  dwelling-place,  we  cannot  accept  the 
view  that  Jahaveh  is  regarded  by  the  author  of  this  song 
as  limited  by  space  or  time  in  the  circumscribed  way 
imputed  to  Him ;  but,  on  the  contrary,  we  are  bound 
to  conclude  that  the  poet  looked  upon  Him  as  one  whose 


David  made  to  serve  other  Gods.  195 

power  could  be  exerted,  as  on  Sinai,  so  in  North  Pales- 
tine, a  land  which  He  had  not  yet  made  His  own,  accord- 
ing to  the  theory.  That  this  more  exalted  view  is  the 
only  one  in  keeping  with  the  tenor  of  the  song,  will,  I 
think,  be  evident  to  one  reading  the  whole  piece,  with 
its  ever-recurring  "  Bless  ye  Jahaveh " ;  and  its  grand 
conclusion,  "  So  let  all  thine  ^  enemies  perish,  0  Jahaveh ; 
but  let  them  that  love  Him  be  as  the  sun  when  he 
goeth  forth  in  his  might."  Whatever  may  have  been 
tlie  earliest  conceptions  entertained  of  Jahaveh,  or  the 
conceptions  of  the  people  generally  at  their  lowest,  the 
tribes  of  Israel  must  have  had  convictions  based  on  ex- 
perience of  the  power  of  their  God  to  help  them  any- 
where before  a  poet  could  have  celebrated  the  events  of 
that  day  in  the  strains  here  employed. 

Another  argument  is  drawn  from  the  alleged  fact  that 
even  in  David's  time  Jahaveh's  power  to  hear  and  to 
help  was  circumscribed  by  the  boundaries  of  the  Holy 
Land ;  ^  for  David  complains  in  regard  to  his  enemies : 
"  They  have  driven  me  out  tliis  day  that  I  should  not 
cleave  unto  [have  no  share  in,  marg.']  the  inheritance  of 
Jahaveh,  saying,  Go,  serve  other  gods "  (1  Sam.  xxvi. 
19).  The  passage  has  been  made  a  great  deal  of  by 
most  writers  of  the  modern  school.  But  they  may  be 
asked  to  explain  the  meaning  of  the  same  expressions,  • 
put  even  more  strongly,  in  a  book  which  belongs,  ac- 
cording to  them,  to  a  period  when  the  "  ethic  mono- 
theism "  had  asserted  itself.  In  Deuteronomy  chap, 
xxviii.,  among  the  misfortunes  threatened  for  disobedi- 
ence of  Jahaveh's  law,  it  is  said:  "Jahaveh  shall  bring 
thee,  and  thy  king  which  thou  shalt  set  over  thee,  unto 
a  nation   which    thou    hast    not    known,   thou    nor   thy 

»  See  Note  XVIII. 


196  The  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity. 

fathers;  and  there  shalt  thou  serve  other  gods,  wood  .ind 
stone"  (v.  36):  and  again, — "Jahaveh  shall  scatter  thee 
among  all  peoples,  from  the  one  end  of  the  earth  even 
unto  the  other  end  of  the  earth ;  and  there  thou  shalt 
serve  other  gods,  which  thou  hast  not  known,  thou  nor 
thy  fathers,  even  wood  and  stone"  (v.  64).  This  is 
surely  as  strong  an  expression  of  the  idea  that  foreign 
countries  were  under  the  tutelary  care  of  foreign  divini- 
ties as  tlie  words  of  David.  Whatever  may  have  been 
the  precise  signification  of  such  phrases  to  the  minds 
of  the  ordinary  people  employing  them  (if  they  had  a 
precise  signification  at  all),  we  are  not  justified  in  con- 
cluding that  in  either  of  the  passages  they  amounted  to 
a  belief  that  the  power  of  Jahaveh  ceased  when  His 
worshipper  went  beyond  Palestine.  David,  in  point  of 
fact,  was  in  the  wilderness  of  Ziph,  within  the  inheri- 
tance of  Jahaveh,  in  that  sense,  when  he  used  the  words. 
And  let  the  context  in  the  book  of  Deuteronomy  be 
noted.  Immediately  after  the  verse  last  quoted,  follow 
the  words:  "And  among  these  nations  shalt  thou  find 
no  ease,  and  there  shall  be  no  rest  for  the  sole  of  thy 
foot;  but  Jahaveh  shall  give  thee  there  a  trembling 
heart,  and  failing  of  eyes,  and  pining  of  soul,"  &c. 
(v.  65).  Moreover,  in  chap.  xxx.  1-3,  we  have  the 
following :  "  It  shall  come  to  pass,  when  all  these 
things  are  come  upon  thee,  the  blessing  and  the  curse, 
which  I  have  set  before  thee,  and  thou  shalt  call 
them  to  mind  among  all  the  nations  whither  Jaliaveh 
thy  God  hath  driven  thee,  and  shalt  return  unto  Jahaveh 
thy  God,  and  shalt  obey  His  voice,  according  to  all  that  I 
command  thee  this  day,  .  .  .  that  then  Jahaveli  thy  God 
v>ill  turn  thy  captivity,  and  have  compassion  upon  thee, 
and  will  return  and  gather  thee  from   all  the  peoples, 


The  Passage  in  Deuteronomy,  197 

whither  Jahaveli  thy  God  hath  scattered  thee.  If  any 
of  thine  outcasts  be  in  the  uttermost  parts  of  heaven, 
from  thence  will  Jahaveh  thy  God  gather  thee,"  &c.,  &c. 
From  all  which  we  conclude  that  tlie  "  serving  of  other 
gods,"  which  is  made  a  necessary  consequence  of  being 
driven  out  from  the  inheritance  of  Jahaveh,  must  be 
taken  in  a  sense  compatible  with  the  belief  that  He 
has  power  to  control  the  destinies  of  His  outcast  ones  in 
their  banishment,  to  hear  their  penitent  cry,  and  to  bring 
them  again,  in  spite  of  their  enemies  and  in  s^^ite  of 
strange  gods,  to  their  own  land.  There  is  not  a  particle 
of  proof  that  David  thought  his  God  would  no  longer  be 
able  to  hear  and  help  him  when  he  was  driven  away 
from  his  own  home ;  and  there  is  explicit  proof  that  the 
writer  of  the  words  in  Deuteronomy,  while  employing 
expressions  exactly  like  David's,  held  quite  the  opposite. 
And  thus  the  refutation  of  this  low  view  of  the  Davidic 
religion  gives  a  very  strong  confirmation  to  the  Biblical 
view,  for  it  brings  to  light  a  conception  in  pre-prophetic 
Israel — at  the  time  of  the  Judges  even — of  Jaliaveh's 
power  to  hear  and  help,  which  we  have  no  reason  to 
believe  other  nations  entertained  of  their  gods.  The 
instance  brought  forward  by  Renan^  stands  on  a  much 
lower  level.  A  certain  Salms^zab,  in  an  inscription 
found  at  Teima,  in  the  heart  of  Arabia,  not  only  stipu- 
lates his  right  to  offer  in  a  strange  land  sacrifices  to  his 
own  god,  whose  priest  he  is,  but  desires  that  the  gods 
of  these  strange  countries,  whose  power  he  recognises, 
may  be  pleased  with  the  sacrifices  which  he  will  offer 
to  his  own  god,  and  regard  tliem  as  offered  to  themselves. 
Moreov^er,  he  desires  that  the  sacred  place  consecrated  to 
his  god  may  be  under  the  protection  of  the  gods  of  Teima ; 

^  Histoire  du  Peuple  d'Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  36. 


198  The  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity, 

he  establishes  and  endows  in  a  strange  land  the  worship 
of  his  own  god ;  and  the  gods  of  Teima  accept  the  stipu- 
lation, become  guarantees  for  its  performance,  and  accord 
their  protection  to  Salms(^zab.  With  this  proceeding  ^T. 
Eenan  compares  the  vow  of  Jacob  at  Beth-el,  "  If  Jahaveli 
be  with  me,  and  keep  me  in  the  way  that  I  go,  .  .  .  Ja- 
Imveh  shall  be  my  God,  and  this  stone  shall  be  Beth- 
Elohim : "  and  he  adds,^ — "  Perhaps  under  the  reign  of 
Solomon  there  took  place  more  than  one  convention  of 
this  kind.  Perhaps  even  the  temple  of  Solomon  saw 
Tyrians  sacrificing  to  Baal,  with  the  pretension  that 
these  sacrifices  were  not  disagreeable  to  Jahaveh." 

All  this  is  very  different  from  anything  we  find  in  the 
actual  documents.  Jacob  never  mentions  the  gods  of  the 
strange  land  into  which  he  is  going,  but  considers  the 
presence  of  his  own  God  sufficient  for  protection  and 
sustenance.  And  in  Deuteronomy  the  God  of  the  scat- 
tered Israelites  is  to  be  with  them,  inflicting  chastisement, 
hearing  their  prayer,  and  bringing  them  back  witliout 
any  reference  to  the  power  of  the  heathen  gods.  As 
to  what  went  on  at  Jerusalem  in  Solomon's  time,  the 
Biblical  historians  make  no  effort  to  conceal  his  doings ; 
and  notwithstanding  the  assertion  to  the  contrary,  we 
have  very  good  reason  for  believing  that  his  conduct  did 
not  pass  without  rebuke  from  the  men  of  his  own  time. 
There  is  nothing  to  favour  the  view  of  Eenan  that  an 
eclecticism  of  gods  was  the  authorised  or  even  the  current 
religious  practice  of  those  times.  On  the  contrary,  as  we 
have  already  seen  that  even  in  the  most  idolatrous  times 
the  people  refrained  from  naming  themselves  after  foreign 
gods,  so  also,  wherever  we  find  the  worship  of  such  gods 
mentioned,  there  is  always  the  accompanying  conscious- 

^  Histoire  du  Peuple  d'Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  38. 


Animism  and  Fetishism,  199 

ness  that  they  are   foreign  gods,  and  not   the   rightful 
objects  of  worship  to  the  Israelites. 

It  is  to  be  observed,  however,  that  the  argument  as  to 
the  dwelling-place  of  deity  is,  in  principle,  much  more 
than  an  attempt  to  prove  Jahaveh's  close  association  with 
Mount  Sinai  or  the  Holy  Land.  It  is  maintained  that 
there  are  even  more  crude  or  elementary  conceptions  of 
the  dwelling-place  and  energy  of  the  national  god,  which 
prove  clearly  "that  the  pre-prophetic  religion  of  Israel 
grew  out  of  a  blending  of  the  Jahaveh  religion  with 
certain  elements  of  an  older  animistic  or  fetishistic  re- 
ligion found  on  the  west  of  the  Jordan."^  The  ancient 
Israelite,  says  Stade,  had  no  idea  that  God  dwelt  in 
lieaven.  If  he  is  the  god  of  the  thunder  and  lightning, 
he  might  have  been  supposed  to  dwell  above  the  clouds. 
But  that  view  was  not  taken.  He  dwells  on  earth,  al- 
though the  views  as  to  the  precise  place  he  inhabits  are 
confused  and  contradictory.  Along  with  the  belief  ac- 
cepted by  Israel  in  the  adoption  of  the  Jahaveh  religion, 
that  He  had  His  dwelling  on  Sinai,  is  found  the  wide- 
spread belief  that  Jahaveh  inhabits  the  sanctuaries  of 
the  land.  It  was  a  common  belief  among  primitive 
peoples  that  the  deity  dwelt  where  he  was  worshipped, 
l)eing  confined  in  the  temple,  and  that  he  left  the  sanc- 
tuary before  it  passed  into  the  hands  of  an  enemy.  The 
belief,  too,  among  ancient  Israel  amounted  to  this,  that 
Jahaveh  in  His  entireness  inhabited  each  sanctuary.  He 
was  not  held  to  be  everywhere  present,  but  He  was  to  be 
found  at  these  different  sanctuaries. 

Stade  explains  the  origin  of  this  belief  by  the  fact  that 
the  sanctuaries  in  question  were,  before  the  Israelite  con- 
quest of  Canaan,  the  abodes  of  different  Canaanite  numina^ 

^  Stade,  Geschichte,  i.  p.  446. 


200  Tlie  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity. 

and  that  when  the  Jahaveh  worship  overcame  the  Canaan- 
ite  religion,  Jahaveh  took  possession  of  these  holy  places. 
And  so  it  came  about  that  the  old  Israelite,  without 
feeling  conscious  of  the  contradiction  to  the  Jahaveh  re- 
ligion which  it  involved,  spoke  of  the  "  god  of  Dan  "  and 
tlie  "  god  of  Beersheba  "  (Amos  viii.  14) ;  ^  of  the  Jahaveh 
Shalom  at  Ophrah  (Judges  vi.  24) ;  of  the  El  who  had 
revealed  himself  at  Betli-el  (Gen.  xxxi.  13) ;  as  also  of 
the  One  who  appeared  to  Hagar  (Gen.  xvi.  13).  And 
expressions  used  by  the  prophets,  such  as  "  the  sin  of 
Samaria"  (Amos  viii.  14),  "the  calf  of  Samaria"  (Hosea 
viii.  5,  6),  are  just  their  mode  of  indicating  what,  in  tlie 
popular  language,  would  be  "  the  god  or  Jahaveh  of 
Samaria."  Yea,  the  prophets  not  only  do  not  fully 
break  away  from  tliis  old  popular  conception ;  they 
actually  take  it  up  in  another  form.  They  reprove  the 
people,  for  example,  for  localising  God  at  Beth-el,  and  so 
forth,  but  take  it  as  a  matter  of  course  that  He  has  His 
dwelling  on  Mount  Zion  at  Jerusalem,^  which  was,  as 
Ezekiel  expresses  it,  the  place  of  His  throne  and  the 
place  of  the  soles  of  His  feet  (Ezek.  xliii.  7) ;  and  which, 
as  that  prophet  believes.  He  forsook  before  the  destruc- 
tion of  Jerusalem.  How  then  was  this  dwelling  of 
Jahaveh  at  different  sanctuaries  reconciled  with  the  be- 
lief in  His  unity  ?  In  this  way.  The  place  was  not  con- 
sidered sacred  because  Jahaveh  dwelt  there,  but  because 
He  had  once  appeared  there.  This  was  the  way  that  the 
priestly  legend  accounted  for  the  existence  and  reverence 
of  these  sacred  places,  associating  each  of  them  with  sonre 
theophany  in  the  lives  of  the  patriarchs  or  national  heroes. 
So  Hebron,  Beersheba,  Ophrah,  Beth-el,  Zion,  had  each  its 
.story  connected  with  it  of  a  manifestation  of  Jahaveh  to 
1  Geschichte,  i.  p.  447.  2  Yb^^^ ^  p  443^ 


Jaliaveh  and  the  Local  Sanctuaries.  201 

His  favoured  ones.  But  this  mode  of  accommodation  is 
contradicted  by  the  usage  of  the  ritual  language  which 
represents  Jahaveh  as  located  in  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem 
from  the  time  that  His  ark  was  placed  there.  This 
localising  of  Jahaveh's  presence  at  different  sanctuaries 
is  of  course,  Stade  proceeds,  opposed  to  the  true  Jahaveh 
religion.  The  God  who  had  brought  the  people  from 
Sinai  was  everywhere  present,  and  could  be  worshipped 
everywhere ;  but  in  practice,  and  in  point  of  fact,  He  was 
honoured  only  at  particular  places.  The  priestly  account 
of  the  matter  was,  that  He  could  be  worsliipped  only  at 
places  where  He  had  made  His  presence  known,  and  even 
the  book  of  the  Covenant  assumes  the  same  thing  (Exod. 
XX.  24).  But  as  these  sanctuaries  were  in  existence 
before  Israel  came  into  the  land,  and  as  they  coincided 
with  certain  prominent  features  of  the  country,  we  must 
conclude  that  the  proposition,  "  Jahaveh  is  to  be  wor- 
shipped wherever  He  has  made  Himself  known  to  the 
fathers,"  simply  amounts  to  this  :  "  Jahaveh  is  worshipped 
wherever  He  has  in  fact  been  believed  to  reside." 

So  then,  Stade  argues,  the  whole  worship  of  ancient 
Israel  comes  under  the  category  of  the  worship  so  much 
blamed  by  the  prophets — viz.,  the  worship  of  "  the  high 
places,  under  green  trees."  We  have  good  grounds,  he 
says,  for  concluding  that  every  prominent  situation  had  its 
Bamah,  or  high  place,  just  as  every  good  site  in  Christian 
countries  has  its  church.  The  belief  that  the  gods  inhabit 
the  hills  is  found  among  ancient  Greeks,  liomans,  and 
Indians;  and  in  no  Semitic  land  is  it  more  strikingly 
seen  than  in  Palestine,  in  which  a  sacredness  attaches  to 
every  mountain,^  and  in  which  we  have  quite  a  number 
of  places  named  Bamah,  Mizpah,  Gibeah,  all  of  a  sacred 

^  Geschiclite,  i.  p.  449  f.  / 


202  The  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity. 

character.  It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  such  places 
were  the  seats  of  an  old  astral  or  solar  worship:  they 
were  old  sacred  places  or  seats  of  deity,  and  became 
sacred  to  Jahaveh  after  Israel  passed  into  the  country. 
The  prophets  call  the  old  Israelite  worship  the  worship 
of  the  high  places,  and  the  Syrians  are  made  to  say  that 
the  gods  of  the  Hebrews  are  gods  of  the  hills  (1  Kings 
XX.  23). 

To  explain  how  this  worship  of  the  high  places  origi- 
nated, Stade  says  it  is  to  be  noted  that  at  these  sacred 
places  are  found  graves  of  patriarchs  or  other  heroes. 
Thus  Hebron  was  the  burying-place  of  Abraham,  and, 
according  to  later  tradition,  of  the  whole  family  of  the 
patriarchs.  In  Shechem  the  bones  of  Joseph  are  placed  ; 
Kadesh-Barnea  is  associated  with  the  oldest  traditions  of 
the  tribe  of  Levi ;  and  there  Miriam  is  buried.  We  find 
also  sacred  trees  at  most  of  these  places,  or  sacred  foun- 
tains, as  at  Beersheba,^  and  sacred  stones  at  Beth-el 
and  elsewhere.  And  in  these  particulars  there  is  a  great 
resemblance  to  the  legends  attached  to  the  graves  of 
Greek  heroes.  The  conclusion  to  which  Stade  comes  from 
these  indications  is,  that  before  there  was  an  altar  and 
offering  of  sacrifices  to  Jahaveh  at  Hebron  and  Shechem, 
for  example,  it  had  been  a  custom  to  make  offerings  at 
these  places  to  the  souls  of  the  heroes  whose  names  are 
associated  with  each  place;  and  thus  we  obtain  proof 
that  the  worship  of  ancestors  was  a  primitive  usage 
among  the  Hebrews.^     The  graves  of  ever  so  many  of  the 

^  Geschichte,  i.  p.  451. 

^  Stade  ascribes  to  this  custom  as  a  social  influence  the  formation  of 
families  into  septs  and  then  into  tribes.  The  derivation  of  whole  tribes 
from  a  common  ancestor  and  the  naming  of  them  by  his  name  thus  rest, 
according  to  this  view,  on  ancestral  worship. 


TheElim.  203 

legendary  personages  are  thus  specially  mentioned.  The 
remarkable  exception  in  the  case  of  Moses,  whose  grave 
is  not  known,  may  be  a  silent  protest  against  the  wor- 
sliip  of  ancestors,  which  is  opposed  to  the  religion  which 
Moses  made  known.  Or  it  may  be  that  he  is  less  of 
a  legendary  character  than  others  whose  graves  are 
known ;  although  it  is  not  to  be  concluded  that  every 
one  whose  grave  is  honoured  is  a  legendary  character. 
A  confirmation  of  the  position  now  reached  is  found, 
Stade  proceeds,  in  the  proofs  we  have  that  trees,  stones, 
and  so  forth,  were  also  considered  sacred  objects  among 
the  ancient  Hebrews.  By  the  altars  in  the  high  places 
trees  were  planted,  and  pillars  of  wood  and  Maqgebas  of 
stone  were  set  up ;  and  these  are  condemned  by  the 
prophets  as  elements  of  tlie  old  false  worship.  The  names 
given  to  the  trees, — elah,  elon  ;  allah,  alldn, — though  gener- 
ally explained  to  mean  terebinth  and  oak,  have  no  doubt 
a  trace  of  old  animistic  belief  attached  to  them,  for  the 
elah  or  allah  (according  to  the  Masoretic  pointing  made 
to  differ,  but  consonantally  identical  rh^)  is  no  doubt  the 
nomen  unitatis  of  el,  which  has  its  plural  elim.  The  green 
tree,  with  its  perennial  life,  was  thus  no  doubt  among 
the  Hebrews,  as  among  pagans,  regarded  as  animated  with 
the  life  of  a  numen.  The  reverence  for  sacred  stones  is 
no  less  remarkable.  The  stone  at  Beth-el  is  invested  with 
sanctity  and  worshipped,  and  there  are  several  such 
stones  at  Gilgal.  Though  all  these  again  are  explained 
as  made  sacred  by  some  appearance  of  Jahaveh  at  the 
place  where  they  are  found,  it  is  clear  they  are  traces  of 
old  fetishistic  worship.  And  the  best  proof  of  all  is  the 
story  of  the  sacred  ark  itself,  which  cannot  be  regarded 
as  different  essentially  from  other  sacred  arks  of  a  similar 
kind  among  Etruscans,  Egyptians,  Trojans,  and  Greeks, 


204  The  Divelling -place  of  the  Deity, 

which  contained  images  or  fetishes.  For  by  the  ancient 
Israelite,  Jahaveh  was  supposed  actually  to  dwell  in  the 
ark ;  and  only  in  this  way  is  explained  the  misfortune  of 
the  loss  of  the  ark  in  tlie  Philistine  war,  and  the  great  care 
which  David  took  to  place  it  in  a  safe  place  at  Jerusalem. 
The  tradition  that  the  ark  contained  two  tables  of  stone 
undoubtedly  rests  on  some  fact,  and  this  fact  is  that  an- 
cient Israel  had  such  an  ark  with  two  actual  stones — 
perhaps  meteoric  stones — connected  with  and  representing 
the  god  of  the  storm.  The  priestly  explanation  here  given, 
again,  is  perhaps  a  silent  rebuke  of  the  primitive  fetish- 
worship,  when  it  represents  the  stones  as  being  the  two 
tables  of  the  law. 

There  is  in  this  a  great  deal  that  is  exceedingly  in- 
genious. There  is  much  also  tliat  is  suggestive  and 
valuable,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  comparative 
study  of  religions,  as  showing  how  the  religious  senti- 
ment finds  expression  for  itself  through  the  medium  of 
language  and  forms.  Thought  is  at  all  times  limited 
and  circumscribed  when  it  sets  itself  to  give  expression 
to  supersensible  things ;  forms  more  or  less  crude,  and 
language  necessarily  metaphorical,  must  be  resorted 
to ;  and  in  this  respect  the  development  of  religious 
thought  must  ever  be  the  same  among  all  peoples.  We 
must,  however,  be  careful,  in  reasoning  from  the  outward 
forms  in  which  such  sentiments  are  expressed,  to  test 
our  conclusions  by  actual  facts,  if  they  are  available, 
showing  the  sense  that  underlay  the  forms.  In  Stade's 
reasoning,  however,  there  is  a  great  deal  of  debatable 
matter,  not  only  in  the  bold  inferences  drawn,  but  in 
the  statements  of  assumed  fact.  There  is,  moreover, 
such  a  display  of  erudition,  such  a  combination  of  di- 
verse   materials,   and    piecing    together    of    things    that 


Manipulation  of  "  Sources!'  205 

stand  far  apart,  that,  unless  we  look  into  his  argument 
somewhat  closely,  we  shall  be  smothered  in  a  mass  of 
distracting  particulars. 

A  remark  may  be  made  at  the  outset  on  the  peculiar 
manipulation  of  the  "  sources  "  in  this  argument.    Writers 
of  Stade's  school  are  never  tired  of  repeating  tliat  written 
documents  give  us  certain  information  only  in  regard  to 
the  period  at  which  they  are  composed.     They  declare,  at 
the  same  time,  that  we  have  no  authentic  written  docu- 
ments before  the  eighth  or  ninth  century  B.C.    These  docu- 
ments, therefore,  ought  only  to  be  taken  as  evidences  of 
the  religious  conceptions  of  that  period ;  and  yet  Stade 
relies  on  them  for  proof  of  the  religious  beliefs  of  Israel 
at  the  time  of,  and  even  long  before  the  time  of  Moses. 
This    he   does,  however,   only  when   he   finds   elements 
giving  countenance  to  his  own  theory;   for  the  moment 
that  a  writer  of  this  period  gives  his  testimony  to  the 
Biblical  theory,  his  evidence  is  discredited  as  a  modern 
reading  of  old  facts,  or  even  a  later  interpolation  of  a 
redactor.     To  such  straits  are  writers  of  this  school  re- 
duced,  that  they  have  to  employ  discredited  works   to 
build  up  their  own  theory — reminding  one  of  the  Irish 
Board  of  Guardians  who  resolved  first  to  build  a  new 
workhouse  out  of  the  materials  of  tlie  old ;  and  secondly, 
to  allow  the  old  workhouse  to  stand  till  the  new  one  was 
erected.     If  those  stories  of  the  patriarchs  and  suchlike, 
which  are  here  appealed  to,  are  of  value  for  determining 
the  ideas  of  that  early  age,  what  becomes  of  the  assertion 
that  they  are  the  late  dressing  up  of  historical  events  ? 
If,  strictly  taken,  they  are  merely  the  expression  of  the 
ideas  of  writers  of  the  ninth  century,  we  are  as  far  as  ever 
from  reaching  the  early  age.     If,  again,  the  argument  is 
based  on  the  forms  of  speech,  it  is  another  case  of  false 


206  The  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity.  ^ 

reasoning   from  metaphorical   or  mythological  language, 
such  as  we  saw  in  the  last  chapter. 

To  come,  however,  to  Stack's  argument,  there  seems  to 
nie  to  be  some  confusion  in  his  reasoning.  He  asserts 
that  the  pre-prophetic  religion  of  Israel  grew  out  of  a 
blending  of  the  Jahaveh  religion  with  elements  of  an 
older  fetishistic  kind  found  on  the  west  of  the  Jordan ;  ^ 
nnd  afterwards,  in  speaking  of  the  localising  of  Jahaveh 
at  the  different  sanctuaries,  he  says :  "  This  localising  of 
Jahaveh's  presence  at  different  sanctuaries  is  of  course 
opposed  to  the  true  Jahaveh  religion.  The  God  who  had 
brouglit  tlie  people  from  Sinai  was  everywhere  present  and 
could  be  worshipped  everywhere ;  but  in  point  of  fact  and 
in  practice,  He  was  honoured  only  at  particular  places."  ^ 
Here  it  would  seem  to  be  implied  that  the  lower  ani- 
mistic and  fetishistic  elements  were  found  by  Israel  on 
their  entrance  into  Canaan,  and  taken  into  the  Jahaveh 
religion ;  and  also  that,  whereas  they  had  attained  under 
Moses  to  the  idea  that  God  was  everywhere  present,  yet 
on  coming  into  the  land  of  Canaan,  they  learned  to  localise 
Him.  Stade  thus  seems  inadvertently  to  admit  the  Bib- 
lical statement  of  the  case — viz.,  that  Israel  in  Canaan 
learned  the  ways  of  the  Canaan ites,  and  thereby  fell  away 
from  their  own  God.  He  can  scarcely,  however,  mean 
this,  or  imply  that  Israel,  when  they  received  the  know- 
ledge of  Jahaveh,  had  no  superstitions  of  their  own, 
for  his  whole  argument  is  led  with  a  view  of  reach- 
ing the  nature  basis  of  the  pre-Mosaic  religion.  It  is 
strange,  in  this  view,  that  he  should  have  to  come  to 
Canaan  for  so  much ;  and  he  ought  to  tell  us  clearly 
whether  the  process  of  development  after  Moses  was  a 
process  of  deterioration  from  the  Jahaveh  religion,  or  a 

1  Geschiclite,  i.  p.  446.  =  Ibid.,  p.  449. 


Greek y  Roman,  and  Bedaioin  Tribes.  207 

process  of  elimination  of  older  animistic  notions  by  the 
force  of  the  new  faith,  or  whether  both  processes  went  on 
simultaneously.  No  one  doubts  that  the  popidar  religion 
was  deeply  affected  by  contact  with  Canaanitish  idolatry  ; 
nor  need  we  ignore  the  tendency  seen  everywhere,  even 
when  a  purer  faith  has  been  learned,  to  run  into  carnal 
and  limited  conceptions  and  modes  of  expression,  and  the 
cropping  up  everywhere  in  human  history  of  the  hard 
granite  of  underlying  superstition.  Stade  himself,  how- 
ever, falls  back  upon  the  existence  of  a  purer  and  better 
religion,  made  known  in  the  time  of  Moses ;  and  if  this 
point  is  established,  the  Biblical  theory  is  so  far  confirmed. 
In  the  absence  of  direct  historical  evidence  in  regard  to 
the  earlier  periods  of  Israel's  history,  Stade  refers  to  tlie 
conditions  under  which  tribes  were  formed  among  tlie 
ancient  inhabitants  of  Greece  and  Eome,  and  the  mode  of 
growth  of  the  pre-Islamic  Bedawin  tribes.  Such  com- 
parisons are  deeply  instructive  for  the  light  they  throw 
upon  the  manner  in  which  the  human  mind  comports 
itself  when  confronted  with  the  problems  of  religion.  Yet 
the  history  of  the  religious  life  of  Israel  is  so  unique  that 
we  have  always  to  be  on  our  guard  against  assuming  for 
it  precisely  the  same  kind  of  development  as  is  found  in 
other  nations.  It  may  be  that  the  religious  phraseology 
of  the  Hebrews  is  exactly  like  that  of  polytheistic  nations, 
though  Eenan,  for  example,  would  deny  it ;  and  it  may  be 
safe  to  infer  that  this  similarity  proves  that  the  'primitive 
notions  of  both  were  similar.  But  the  question  is.  When 
was  the  primitive  stage  among  the  Hebrews  ?  The  first 
attempts  of  man  to  express  conceptions  of  unseen  things 
result  in  metaphor,  and  all  religious  language  is  meta- 
phorical. But  metaphorical  language  may  be  employed 
by  a  people  long  after  they  have  passed  beyond  a  primi- 


208  The  Dwelling-place  of  the  Deity. 

live  stage  of  intelligence.  "We  use  to  the  present  day, 
witliout  being  misled  by  it,  phraseology  full  of  anthropo- 
morphisms, and  speak  of  God  in  the  very  language 
employed  in  the  earliest  Hebrew  writings.  To  take 
such  phrases  in  the  strictly  literal  sense,  and  to  maintain 
that  where  they  were  employed  by  the  Hebrews  they  had 
tliat  sense,  is  to  ignore  the  simplest  laws  of  language,  and 
to  overlook  the  growth  of  reflection.  Surely  no  one 
expects  to  find  in  tlie  pre-prophetic  period  the  abstrac- 
tions and  generalisations  of  the  modern  philosophy  of  reli- 
gion. The  very  best  of  the  prophets  never  moved  in  that 
direction ;  their  conceptions  of  God  may  be  said  to  be  not 
so  much  excogitated  as  intuitively  grasped,  and  they  were 
content  to  employ  the  same  phrases  as  had  been  employed 
from  of  old  by  men  who  could  not  have  reached  their 
lofty  conceptions.  Stade  might  have  perceived  that  in 
referring  to  Ezekiel's  belief  that  God  left  the  Temple 
before  Jerusalem  was  destroyed,  he  was  refuting  his  own 
argument ;  or  would  he,  for  example,  infer  from  the 
words  in  an  exilian  psalm,  "  How  shall  we  sing  Jahaveh's 
song  in  a  strange  land  ? "  (Ps.  cxxxvii.  4),  that  even  at  that 
late  period  the  Israelites  still  believed  that  their  national 
God  was  confined  to  Palestine  ?  If  the  prophets  of  Israel 
ever  attained  to  a  conception  of  a  God  who  was  every- 
where present,  spiritual,  and  unique,  they  had  attained  it 
in  Ezekiel's  time  in  the  captivity.  To  make  this  prophet 
hold  the  crude  idea  said  to  be  held  by  pre-proplietic 
men,  that  the  deity  dwelt  in  a  certain  sanctuary  in  the 
limited  sense  described,  is  to  reduce  the  whole  reasoning 
to  absurdity,  and  to  make  the  tracing  of  development 
impossible. 

It  is  no  doubt  true  that  certain  places  were  to  the  an^ 
cient  Israelite  more  sacred  than  others,  and  there  can  be 


Hallowed  Places,  209 

no  doubt  that  superstitious  reverence  was  paid  by  the 
ignorant  and  carnal-minded  to  places  and  things.  We 
are  not,  however,  inquiring  as  to  the  superstitions  of  the 
common  people,  but  as  to  the  truth  that  had  been  made 
known  to  the  teachers  and  guides  of  the  nation.  For  that 
matter,  we  have  not  yet  outgrown  a  certain  reverence  for 
places  associated  with  great  historical  or  religious  events, 
and  what  Stade  calls  the  priestly  tradition  is  just  as  likely, 
in  the  circumstances,  to  be  a  true  account  of  the  matter  as 
the  one  which  he  gives.  A  people  who  already  had,  accord- 
ing to  Stade's  own  admission,  a  knowledge  of  a  God  who 
was  everywhere,  and  who  could  help  anywhere,  was  quite 
likely  to  regard  with  special  reverence  such  places  as 
had  been  the  scene  of  critical  events,  or  striking  dis- 
plays of  power ;  and  this  in  itself  was  not  and  could  not 
be  reprobated.  The  transition,  however,  from  pious  asso- 
ciation and  veneration  to  superstitious  regard,  is  very  easy 
among  an  unreflecting  people ;  and  the  same  Biblical  writers 
who  record  the  events  which  made  certain  spots  sacred, 
tell  us  also  how  these  very  places  became  the  headquarters 
of  idolatry.  Had  the  prophets  known  that  the  worship- 
pers of  Jahaveh  merely  appropriated  old  heathen  shrines, 
they  would  not  have  omitted  to  mention  it.  Neither  do 
they  give  the  least  hint  that  the  sacred  places  of  the 
Hebrews  were  so  regarded  because  they  were  originally 
the  burial-places  of  Hebrew  or  Canaanite  heroes,  although 
the  fact,  if  it  were  a  fact,  could  scarcely  have  been  without 
a  trace  in  the  national  recollection. 

Stade  also  makes  a  great  deal  of  the  awe  felt  by  the 
Israelite  at  the  thunder,  which  was  God's  voice,  the  import- 
ance attached  to  dreams,  and  so  forth,  taking  all  these  as  so 
many  indications  of  a  primitive  nature-worship.  But  ad- 
mitting here,  also,  the  necessary  imperfection  of  language 

o 


0» 


210  '     TJiC  Dioelling-place  of  the  Deity. 

to  express  religious  conceptions,  and  admitting  that  people 
of  simple  believing  hearts  used  language  of  the  most  in- 
fantile character,  it  is  to  be  observed  that  the  feelings  he 
speaks  of  are  consistent  with  conceptions  of  God  of  a  most 
spiritual  kind.  The  beliefs  of  men  like  Lord  Bacon  and  Sir 
Thomas  Browne,  not  to  mention  others,  sliould  make  us 
very  careful  in  our  reasoning  here;  and  in  point  of  fact, 
the  "superstitions"  even  of  the  popular  conceptions  of 
Israel  do  not  exceed  those  to  be  found  in  the  Christian 
centuries.  If,  with  the  conviction  that  the  God  whom 
they  worshipped  controlled  the  world  of  nature  as  well  as 
the  world  of  man,  the  early  Israelites  heard  His  voice  in 
the  thunder,  and  trembled  before  His  presence  in  the 
storm,  why  should  we  call  this  an  old  belief  in  a  nature- 
God  ?  It  is  quite  as  reasonable  to  call  it  an  inborn  belief 
in  a  God  of  nature;  and  there  are  yet  not  a  few  who  be- 
lieve in  such  a  God,  although  Renan  would  persuade  us  that 
such  a  God  is  a  fiction.  If,  again,  they  felt  His  presence 
particularly  near  in  the  silent  night,  and  recognised  His 
communings  with  their  spirits  in  dreams,  it  is  just  as 
reasonable  to  regard  these  convictions  as  part  of  the  human 
consciousness  that  man  has  a  close  relation  to  the  unseen, 
as  to  say  that  they  are  remnants  of  a  belief  that  every 
bush  or  tree  or  stone  harboured  a  divinity.  It  is  now,  I 
think,  admitted  by  the  most  sober  students  of  anthropol- 
ogy, that  even  the  lowest  forms  of  fetishism  rest  upon 
and  are  the  outcome  of  a  recognition  by  the  human  spirit 
of  a  spirit  above  man  and  nature,  and  that  the  presence  of 
crude  conceptions  or  superstitious  practices  in  the  midst 
.of  a  certain  age  does  not  by  any  means  give  the  key  to  the 
understanding  of  that  whole  age.  Christian  countries 
form  tlie  best  field  for  the  study  of  the  rudest  and  grossest 
superstitions.     And  if  it  be  said  tliat  these  are  the  traces 


Sumval  of  Superstitions.  211 

of  an  older  naturalistic  faith,  the  question  arises,  How  old 
must  they  be  if  eighteen  centuries  of  Christian  civilisation 
have  not  rooted  them  out?^  The  main  point  is:  their 
presence  does  not  prove  that  a  purer  faith,  a  less  super- 
stitious religion,  has  not  been  taught  and  acknowledged 
at  an  earlier  stage. 

In  the  face  of  all  that  is  advanced  to  prove  the  low  stage 
of  pre-prophetic  religion  in  Israel,  we  may  argue  thus : 
Down  to  the  close  of  Israel's  national  existence,  we  find  a 
struggle  going  on  between  a  spiritual  religion  and  the  most 
material  conceptions ;  and,  at  the  first  appearance  of  written 
prophecy,  we  find  the  same,  with  reproof  of  the  carnal- 
minded  for  falling  away  from  a  liigher  faith.  Therefore 
the  struggle  may  have  been  going  on  at  a  period  long  ante- 
cedent ;  at  all  events,  it  is  not  yet  proved  that  it  began 
with  the  prophets  whose  writings  have  come  down  to  us. 
I  believe  that  an  unprejudiced  view  of  all  the  evidence 
will  lead  to  the  conclusion  that,  as  the  existence  of  narrow 
and  sensuous  views  is  attested  by  historians  and  prophets 
alike,  so  history  and  prophecy  are  alike  unintelligible 
without  admitting  the  presence  at  the  same  time  of  a 
better  and  purer  faith. 

Finally,  however,  we  have,  it  seems  to  me,  a  sure  mode 
of  testing  the  conclusions  drawn  on  this  precarious  method 
of  reasoning.  If  these  animistic  and  fetishistic  concep- 
tions lingered  on  till  the  time  of  the  Jahavist,  and  found 
embodiment  in  his  stories,  we  ought  to  find  clear  indica- 
tions of  them  in  other  writings  that  belong  to  about  the 
same  period,  and  to  be  able  to  test  them  by  statements  of 
a  more  decisive  nature.  Critical  writers,  it  is  true,  do 
not  give  us  much  latitude  in  our  selection  of  authorities. 

'  For  some  curious  illustrations,  see  Arthur  Mitchell's  '  The  Past  in  the 
Present'  (1880). 


212  The  Dwelling -2olace  of  the  Deity. 

Still  we  have  some  undoubted  productions  of  the  time, 
or  near  it,  when  these  nature  conceptions  are  said  to 
have  been  prevalent ;  and  if  we  find  in  them  a  mode  of 
speaking  and  thinking  which  is  opposed  to  the  theory, 
we  are  entitled  to  check  the  lower  by  the  higher,  and 
to  accept  the  Biblical  account  that  by  the  time  in  ques- 
tion a  knowledge  of  a  much  higher  kind  had  been  attained. 
Take  the  song  of  Deborah  itself.  Not  only  does  it  give 
no  countenance  to  the  modern  view,  unless  by  a  strained 
turning  of  exalted  poetic  diction  into  flat  prose,  but  its 
whole  tenor  and  tone  show  that  the  tribes  at  that  time 
had  a  much  worthier  conception  of  their  national  God. 
Modern  critics  will  scarcely  admit  any  psalm  to  have 
come  from  David ;  but  there  is  one,  the  18th,  having  its 
counterpart  in  2  Sam.  xxii.,  which  is  often  appealed  to  in 
support  of  the  low  tone  of  pre-prophetic  religion,  and 
which  most  critics  would  accept  as  genuine.  This  psalm, 
as  has  just  been  hinted,  contains  some  highly  figurative 
and  poetical  language  (vv.  6-16),  which  has  been  eagerly 
seized  upon  to  show  that  at  the  time  the  psalm  was  com- 
posed Jahaveh  was  regarded  as  a  nature-God,  riding  upon 
a  cherub,  breathing  forth  fire  and  smoke,  shooting  forth 
lightnings  as  arrows  from  His  bow,  and  so  forth.  P>ut 
the  psalm  contains  also  language  of  a  less  poetical  and 
more  unequivocal  character,  and  it  is  surely  safe  criticism 
to  interpret  the  more  obscure  by  the  light  of  the  more 
evident.  It  may  be  put  to  any  one  of  sober  sense  whether 
the  expressions  that  occur  in  verses  16  and  onwards  are 
compatible  with  the  theory  we  are  considering.  There  is 
here  no  difficulty  in  seeing  the  standpoint  of  the  writer : 
"  As  for  God,  His  way  is  perfect :  the  word  of  Jaliaveh  is 
tried;  He  is  a  buckler  to  all  those  that  trust  in  Him. 
For  who  is  God  save  Jahaveh  ?  or  who  is  a  rock  save 


Metaphorical  Language  tested,  213 

onr  God  ? "  (vv.  30,  31).  Such  expressions  cannot  be 
toned  down  into  a  belief  in  a  mere  storm-God ;  on  the 
contrary,  those  other  expressions,  of  a  highly  poetical 
kind  must  be  taken  to  be  in  harmony  with  this  higher 
tone,  and  therefore  given  up  as  proofs  of  an  animistic 
or  fetishistic  character  of  religious  conception  at  this 
period. 

Then  we  have  the  books  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets, 
Amos  and  Hosea ;  and  Stade  actually  tries  to  base  an 
argument  for  his  theory  on  statements  of  these  prophets, 
although  he  positively  rejects  their  testimony  to  a  purer 
faith  in  the  times  before  them.  And  what  does  his  argu- 
ment from  Amos  amount  to  ?  The  prophet  speaks  of  the 
God  of  Dan  and  the  God  of  Beersheba  (viii.  14) ;  and 
therefore  it  was  part  of  the  acknowledged  religion  of  that 
time  to  regard  the  Deity  as  localised  at  various  centres. 
Now  it  is  to  be  noticed  that  Amos,  in  the  passage  appealed 
to,  is  reproving  those  who  use  such  expressions  as  apos- 
tate, showing,  no  doubt,  that  the  popular  conception  was 
at  fault,  but  giving  no  proof  that  this  aberration  repre- 
sented the  accepted  religion.  And  then,  as  to  the  pro- 
phets having  carried  over  the  localising  tendency,  and 
confined  Jahaveh's  residence  to  Jerusalem,  it  may  be  put 
to  any  sane  person  whether  the  prophet,  who  opens  his 
book  with  the  words,  "  Jahaveh  shall  roar  from  Zion,  and 
litter  His  voice  from  Jerusalem  "  (Amos  i.  2),  and  who  also 
ascribes  to  Jahaveh  the  bringing  of  the  Philistines  from 
Caphtor  and  the  Syrians  from  Kir,  as  well  as  the  Israelites 
from  Egypt  (Amos  ix.  7),  could  possibly  have  thought  of 
Jahaveh  as  confined  within  a  chest  in  the  Temple,  or  even 
limited  to  Jerusalem  as  a  dwelling-place ;  or  whether  the 
prophet  Isaiah,  who  saw  "  Jahaveh  sitting  upon  a  throne, 
high  and  lifted  up,  and  His  train  filled  the  temple"  (Isa. 


214  Hie  Dwelling 'place  of  the  Deity. 

vi.   1),  had  not  vet  got  beyond  a  bodily  conception  of 
Israel's  God. 

If,  then,  witnesses  on  whom  we  rely,  clearly  hold  dif- 
ferent conceptions  from  those  ascribed  to  men  who  are 
almost  their  contemporaries,  we  must  either  conclude 
that  the  lower  views,  if  they  are  proved  to  be  there,  are 
not  to  be  taken  as  held  by  the  best  of  the  nation,  or  that 
they  are  wrongly  ascribed  to  those  to  whom  they  are  im- 
puted. Seeing  that  the  higher  views  are  expressed  in  the 
actual  words  of  the  Biblical  writers,  while  the  lower  are 
only  inferred  from  doubtful  expressions  or  metaphorical 
language,  a  sober  criticism  must  reject  the  inference  which 
Stade  would  draw.  Moreover,  when  Stade  finds  the  most 
primitive  conceptions  existing  side  by  side  with  the  most 
advanced  ideas,  one  is  disposed  to  ask  what  is  the  value  of 
all  the  critical  processes  which  profess  to  be  able  to  separate 
the  component  parts  of  our  documents,  and  to  assign  the 
different  elements  to  different  periods  on  the  ground  of 
the  development  of  thought  which  they  exhibit  ?  Even 
if  we  considered  that  he  had  successfully  proved  that  tliese 
notions  of  an  animistic  or  fetishistic  character  are  fairly 
deducible  from  the  so-called  Jahavistic  source,  seeing  that 
they  are  so  divergent  from  the  conceptions  of  the  writing 
prophets,  the  conclusion,  on  critical  grounds,  ought  to  be 
that  these  stories  of  the  Jahavist  are  much  older  than  the 
eighth  century.  Stade  thinks  himself  capable  of  deter- 
mining on  grounds  of  higher  and  lower  tone  in  speaking 
of  Jahaveh,  that  the  stories  of  the  patriarchs,  being  of 
milder  aspect,  are  later  than  those  of  the  book  of  Judges. 
How  much  earlier,  on  his  own  mode  of  reasoning,  ought 
both  to  be  than  the  writinors  of  Amos  and  Hosea ! 


215 


CHAPTER    IX. 

PRE-PROPHETIC    RELIGION    CONTINUED — VISIBLE 
REPRESENTATIONS   OF   THE   DEITY. 

The  calf-worship  considered^  as  to  the  source  from  which  it  came,  and  as  to 
the  regard  in  which  it  toas  held — Arguments  of  Vatke  and  Kuenen 
from  history  and  from  prophetical  books — Elijah  and  Eiisha — Amos — 
Br  Davidson^ s  statement — Argument  drawn  from  the  ephod — Meaning 
of  the  word,  and  its  alleged  use  to  signify  an  image — Gideon's  ephod— 
Micah  and  the  Danitcs —  Vathe's  account  of  the  ephod — Kuenen^ s  con- 
tradictory accounts — The  whole  argument  uncertain — Stades  pruning- 
Jcnife — "yln  altar  in  the  land  of  Egypt  and  a  pillar  by  its  border" — 
A  passage  in  Ilosea  examined. 

We  have  next  to  consider  the  proofs  brought  forward  to 
show  that  the  Israelites,  lii^e  the  neighbouring  nations, 
were  in  the  habit  of  making  visible  representations  of 
their  national  God,  and  considered  it  no  aberration  from 
their  ancestral  faith  to  do  so.  On  this  line  of  argument, 
reliance  is  particularly  placed  upon  such  facts  as  the 
practice  of  calf-worship,  the  use  and  veneration  of  the 
ephod,  and  various  considerations  drawn  from  the  pro- 
phetical and  historical  writings.  These  we  must  there- 
fore consider  in  detail. 

I.  As  to  the  calf- worship,  Kuenen  says  confidently: 
"Jahveh  was  worshipped  in  the  shape  of  a  young  bull. 
It  may  not  be  doubted  that  the  bull- worship  was  really  the 


216  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deitij. 

worship  of  Jaliveh."  ^  The  account  given  of  the  making 
of  the  golden  calf  in  the  wilderness  (Exod.  xxxii.  8,  23), 
and  the  setting  up  of  calves  in  the  northern  kingdom 
(1  Kings  xii.  28),  show  plainly  enough  that  there  was 
something  in  this  form  or  accompaniment  of  worship, 
which  not  only  did  not  shock  the  religious  sense  of  the 
mass  of  the  people,  but  even  commended  itself  to  them 
as  fitting  and  lawful.  The  question  is,  Was  it  part  and 
parcel  of  the  ancestral  faith  and  worship,  to  such  a  degree 
that  the  preservers  of  the  true  Jahaveh  tradition  saw  in 
it  no  defection  from  the  severity  of  that  religion  ?  To 
arrive  at  a  solution  of  this  question,  we  must  inquire,  (a) 
on  the  one  hand,  from  what  source  the  calf-worship  came 
— whether,  that  is  to  say,  it  is  a  remnant  of  old  pre- 
Mosaic  or  even  pre-Abrahamic  superstition  cropping  up 
at  a  later  time,  or  whether  it  came  along  with  and  a^ 
part  of  the  Israelite  belief  in  Jahaveh,  or  finally,  whether 
it  was  borrowed  and  incorporated  into  their  own  religion 
from  the  religion  of  some  other  people;  and  (b)  on  the 
other  hand,  whether  it  is  formally  approved  of  or  not  rep- 
robated by  those  who  in  the  most  special  manner  stood 
forth  as  representatives  of  the  true  Jahaveh  worship. 

(a)  As  to  the  origin  of  the  calf-worship,  there  is  much 
to  be  said  in  favour  of  the  view  that  the  Israelites  became 
familiar  with  it  in  Egypt,  and  brought  it  with  them  as  an 
inheritance  of  degradation  from  that  country.  The  Old 
Testament  writers  do  not  say  that  it  was  borrowed  from 
Egypt — indeed  they  do  not  tell  us  whence  it  came — but 
there  remain  the  two  facts,  that  it  appeared  first  in  the 
history  immediately  after  the  exodus,  and  that  Jeroboam 
I.,  who  set  it  up  in  the  northern  kingdom,  had  lived  for 
some  time  in  Egypt  and  had  a  patron  in  the  Pharaoh  of 

1  Relig.  of  Israel  (Eng.  tr.),  vol.  i.  p.  235. 


The  Calf -Worship.  217 

his  time.  Moreover,  we  find  even  as  late  as  Ezekiel  the 
firm  tradition  of  an  early  corruption  of  Israelite  faith 
with  the  superstitions  of  Egypt.  In  several  passages  that 
prophet  speaks  of  the  "  idols  of  Egypt "  (xx.  7,  8)  as 
having  had  a  sinister  influence  on  Israel  at  the  time  of 
the  exodus ;  and  of  the  whoredoms  in  Egypt  committed 
in  the  nation's  youth  (xxiii.  3,  8,  19,  21).  In  the  same 
way,  in  the  parting  address  of  Joshua,  the  gods  which 
their  fathers  served  beyond  the  river  are  classed  with 
those  which  they  served  in  Egypt  as  corruptions  to  be  put 
away  (Josh.  xxiv.  14).  It  is  true  that  in  these  passages 
the  worship  of  the  calf  or  tlie  ox  is  not  expressly  men- 
tioned ;  but  when  it  is  remembered  that  the  city  of  On, 
in  which  the  ox  Mnevis  was  worshipped,  lay  in  Goshen 
or  on  its  borders,"^  the  coincidence  of  the  appearance  of 
the  calf-worship  immediately  after  tlie  exodus^  with 
these  references  to  Egyptian  idolatry,  is  very  striking  and 
suggestive.  Gramberg,  for  example,  who  derived  the  calf- 
worship  from  Egypt,  explained  its  prevalence  in  Israel 
after  this  fashion:  The  worship  of  Apis,  once  borrowed 
by  a  people  prone  to  a  visible  cultus,  maintained  itself 
all  along  as  a  private  and  unofficial  worship,  side  by  side 
with  the  ritual  connected  with  the  ark.  Jeroboam,  see- 
ing that  the  Jerusalem  Court  had  possession  of  the  ark, 
and  that  the  Temple  ritual  had  no  image,  made  the  wor- 
ship of  Jahaveh  Apis  the  official  cultus  in  his  new  state, 
this  arrangement  being  favoured   by  the  fact  that   Dan 

^  Ebers  in  llielim's  Handworterbuch,  Art.  On,  p.  1111  f.  Comp.  p.  529, 
Art.  Gosen. 

^  It  may  be  observed  in  passing,  that  modern  critics,  as  a  rule,  find  no 
difficulty  in  accepting  as  a  historical  fact  the  making  of  the  golden  calf  in 
the  desert,  although  they  will  not  admit  that  the  tabernacle  was  also 
made  in  the  wilderness.  Kuenen  is  consistent  in  saying  (Rel.  Isr.,  i.  p. 
23'0  "it  is  doubtful  whether  the  bull-worship  in  the  desert  is  historical." 


218  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

was  already  the  seat  of  an  image  -  worship  of  Jahaveh, 
though  not  perhaps  of  the  calf  -  worship.^  There  is 
the  obvious  objection  to  this  theory,  that  a  people  just 
delivered  from  bondage  to  a  foreign  yoke  was  not  likely 
to  set  up  as  a  symbol  of  the  God  that  delivered  them  the 
very  image  of  the  god  of  their  oppressors.  Moreover, 
although  the  Egyptians  carried  about  images  of  bulls  in 
sacred  processions,  yet  the  object  of  their  veneration  was 
a  live  bull,  Apis.  The  difficulty  indeed  is  so  great,  that 
we  are  rather  led  to  believe  that  the  calf,  whatever  else 
it  was  to  Israel,  was  not  the  actual  symbol  of  any 
Egyptian  deity,  but  was  adopted  as  a  distinctive  symbol 
of  their  own  god  by  a  people  whose  religious  sense  had 
been  so  utterly  debauched  by  residence  in  Egypt,  that 
they  considered  some  visible  representation  of  the  deity 
necessary.  Their  long  sojourn  among  a  people  whose  re- 
ligious service  was  so  overlaid  with  symbolism  and  ima- 
gery could  not  have  been  without  its  effect  in  this  direc- 
tion; just  as  there  are  in  the  ritual  and  other  laws  of 
the  Hebrews  very  striking  resemblances  to  the  customs 
of  Egypt — in  the  Urim  and  Thummim,  for  example. 

The  readiness,  nay  eagerness,  with  which  the  people  in 
the  desert  accepted  the  golden  calf  as  the  symbol  of  the 
God  that  had  brought  them  out  of  Egypt,  the  ease  with 
which  the  worship  of  tlie  calves  was  introduced  by 
Jeroboam,  and  the  fact  that  in  both  cases  a  calf  or 
young  bull  was  taken  as  a  symbol,  are  thought  by  some 
to  have  a  deeper  root.  The  golden  calf  in  the  desert 
could  scarcely  have  been  a  sudden  thought ;  and  we  must 
either  think  of  Israel  having  become  thoroughly  impreg- 
nated with  Egyptian  idolatrous  notions,  or  having  even  in 
their  own  blood,  so  to  speak,  a  leaning  in  that  direction. 

\  Gramberg,  Krit.  Gesch.  d.  Keligionsideen  des  A.  T.  (1829),  i.  p.  444. 


Jeroboam's  Calves.  219 

It  is  still  more  difficult  to  explain  Jeroboam's  step 
as  a  simple  imitation  of  the  gods  of  Egypt.  He  could 
hardly,  one  would  think,  have  appealed  to  Aaron's  act 
as  a  precedent ;  although,  indeed,  the  people  in  the  desert 
is  represented  as  using  the  same  language  as  Jeroboam 
(comp.  Exod.  xxxii.  4,  8,  with  1  Kings  xii.  28).  Nor 
could  his  action  have  well  commended  itself  to  the  ac- 
ceptance of  a  people  who  had  ceased  to  have  sympathy 
with  such  visible  representations  of  the  deity  from  the 
time  of  the  exodus.  Hence  some  of  the  soberer  critics 
of  modern  times  ^  believe  that  the  representation  of  the 
deity  in  this  form  was  an  old  Hebrew  idea,  or  one  of 
those  ideas  common  to  the  Hebrews,  with  their  Semitic 
kindred  and  other  nations.  Against  this  view  it  may  be 
urged  that  in  the  stories  of  Abraham  and  the  other  patri- 
archs there  is  no  reference  to  calf  or  ox  worship  as  remain- 
ing elements  of  pre-Abrahamic  religion,  although  teraphim 
are  mentioned  as  remaining  in  the  family  of  Jacob.  Yet 
since  Abraham  is  represented  as  coming  forth  from  an 
idolatrous  land,  since  the  symbolism  of  bulls  was  common 
in  Assyria,  and  since  the  Israelites  took  to  this  form  of 
representation  so  easily,  there  is  a  good  deal  of  support 
for  the  view  that  it  rests  on  an  old  inherent  conception. 

We  must  not  ignore  the  fact  that  there  is  ever  in  the 
human  mind  a  craving  for  visible  forms  to  express  reli- 
gious conceptions ;  and  history  shows  that  this  tendency 
does  not  disappear  with  the  acceptance  nor  even  with  the 
constant  recognition  of  pure  spiritual  truth.  We  need  not 
be  astonished  at  Israel,  at  the  time  in  question,  manifesting 
the  tendency,  nor  charge  them  with  a  crass  materialistic 
idolatry  in  so  doing.    They  wished,  let  us  suppose,  to  have 

1  See  their  names  in  Konig's  Hauptp'robleme,  p.  57,  from  which,  also,  a 
good  deal  of  what  is  here  stated  is  derived. 


220  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

a  visible  representation  of  strength,  and  they  could  not 
picture  the  abstract  idea  of  Ahir,  Mighty,  in  a  more  obvi- 
ous manner  than  by  an  image  of  the  Abbir,  the  powerful 
Ox.^  That  it  was  an  image  of  an  ox,  and  not  of  a  human 
being  (although  they  used  the  niost  marked  antliropomor- 
phic  language  in  speaking  of  God)  is  to  me  a  strong  reason 
for  supposing  that  the  calf  or  ox  was  not  meant  to  be  an 
actual  image,  but  only  a  symbol,  of  God.  Does  not,  in- 
deed, the  making  of  such  images,  as  unlike  as  possible  to 
the  form  in  which  deity  can  be  conceived,  prove  that  the 
initial  impulse  to  image-making  rests  on  a  more  spiritual 
recognition  of  the  Godhead  ?  It  is  only  when  the  instinc- 
tive impulse  has  stilled  down,  and  the  mass  of  ignorant 
people  rest  in  forms,  that  the  eIkcdv  becomes  a  charm  or 
even  a  god.  Baudissin  says :  ^  "As  the  great  and  mighty 
of  the  earth  are  often  represented  under  the  figure  of 
an  ox,  and  as  especially  the  horn  of  the  ox  is  an  image 
of  strength,  so  the  latter  image  is  not  disdained  as  a  rep- 
resentation of  the  power  and  salvation  proceeding  from 
Jahaveh ; "  and  this  consideration  may  furnish  at  least 
some  explanation  of  the  ideas  on  whose  awakening  in  the 
hearts  of  the  common  people  those  who  introduced  the 
calf- worship  could  count  as  auxiliaries  in  its  adoption.^ 

This  view,  however,  differs  widely  from  that  which  some 
of  the  more  advanced  critics  of  the  history  have  put  for- 
ward— viz.,  that  the  calf  or  ox  worship  was  part  of  the 
authorised  Mosaic  Jahaveh  religion.  On  either  of  the  sup- 
positions that  the  calf-worship  was  borrowed  from  Egypt, 
or  that  it  was  a  primitive  inherent  tendency,  there  is  no 
inconsistency  with  the  Biblical  theory,  which  traces  idol- 

^  Sec  above,  chap.  vii.  p.  188. 

2  Herzog-Plitt,  Realencyklopiidie,  vii.  p.  395  f.,  Art.  Kalb. 

'  So  Konig,  Hauptprobleme,  p.  58. 


Vatke  and  Kuenen  on  Calf-Worship.  221 

atry  to  Egypt,  aud  also  declares  that  the  "  fathers  "  of  Israel 
before  Abraham  served  other  gods.  But  the  idea  that 
the  calf-worship  is  really  part,  or  the  same  as,  the  worship 
of  Jahaveh,  is  quite  opposed  to  the  view  of  prophets  and 
historians.  We  must,  therefore,  examine  its  claims  more 
closely. 

(h)  We  shall  look  presently  at  those  formal  statements 
of  prophetic  writers  which  are  urged  in  support  of  the 
position.  In  the  meantime  we  turn  to  the  considerations 
drawn  from  history  which  are  said  to  warrant  it.  Yatke's 
general  line  of  argument  is,  that  Moses  could  not  have 
forbidden  Israel  to  represent  Jahaveh  in  visible  form ; 
because  even  the  ark  of  the  covenant  with  its  cherubim 
must  have  led  to  such  visible  representation ;  because  the 
prohibition  of  images  in  the  Decalogue  is  a  later  out- 
growth of  the  polemic  against  idol-worship,  a  result  of  the 
gradual  and  later  perception  of  the  spiritual  nature  of 
God  ;  and  because  the  absence  of  opposition  to  idol-worship 
which  we  find  even  in  late  times  is  a  proof  that  Moses 
could  never  have  prohibited  it.^  Kuenen  argues  very 
much  on  the  same  lines.^  "  The  priests  and  worshippers 
•of  the  golden  bull,"  he  says,  "believed  that  they  were 
worshipping  Jahaveh  Himself.  Jeroboam  I.,  too,  the 
founder  of  the  temples  at  Dan  and  Beth-el,  calls  the  image 
made  by  him,  '  Thy  [Israel's]  God,  which  brought  thee  up 
out  of  the  land  of  Egypt ; '  had  it  been  possible  to  inter- 
pret the  golden  bull  as  a  symbol  of  another  deity,  the 
narrator  who  tells  us  this  detail  would  not  have  described 
it  as  a  representation  of  Jahveh."  Then,  after  rejecting 
the  idea  that  the  calf- worship  was  borrowed  from  Egypt, 
he  says :  ^  "It  is  much  more  reasonable  to  suppose  that 

1  Vatke,  Biblische  Theologie  (1835),  pp.  233-235,  266-272,  398,  403,  483. 
-  Relig.  of  Israel  (Eng.  tr.),  vol.  i.  p.  235.  3  ibj^.,  p.  236. 


222  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

the  ten  tribes,  who  rxibelled  against  Solomon's  extortions, 
and  his  leaning  towards  foreign  manners  and  customs, 
introduced  a  genuinely  national  and  ancient  Israelitish 
worship.  For  this  reason,  therefore,  it  is  very  probable 
that  Jahveh  had  already  been  worshipped  under  the  same 
form  during  the  period  of  the  Judges."  ^  He  then  pro- 
ceeds to  refer  to  the  symbols  in  and  around  the  temple, 
wliich  "  remind  us  of  the  bull-worship,  and  are  evidently 
related  to  it,"  the  four  horns  of  the  great  altar,  and  the 
twelve  oxen  supporting  the  brazen  sea  or  laver.  Else- 
where 2  he  argues  that  the  belief  that  Jahaveh  Himself 
was  present  in  the  ark  gives  another  proof  that  he  was 
regarded  as  cognisable  by  sense.  He  also  shares  Yatke's 
view  that  the  prohibition  of  image-worship  in  the  Deca- 
logue comes  in  awkwardly,^  breaking  the  connection  of  the 
words,  and  thus  betraying  itself  as  a  late  addition ;  and 
in  confirmation,  he  refers  to  the  making  of  the  brazen 
serpent,  which  was  worshipped  down  to  the  days  of 
Hezekiah. 

But  all  these  considerations  are  singularly  inadequate 
to  bear  the  weighty  inferences  based  upon  them.  The 
cherubim,  whatever  else  they  may  have  been,  are  never 
hinted  at  as  representations  of  Jahaveh,  who  "sits  above" 
them.  And  the  idea  that  the  Deity  was  believed  to 
reside  in  the  ark  is  one  of  those  precarious  inferences 
from  an  old  presumed  animistic  belief,  which  are  not 
warranted  by  any  positive  evidence  to  be  drawn  from 
the  documents.  As  to  the  prohibition  of  image-worship 
in  the  second  commandment,  this  would  most  likely  sug- 
gest itself  to  a  lawgiver  in  the  position  of  Moses,  in 
view  of  the  idolatrous  practices  of  the  heathen  nations, 

1  So  also  Duhm,  Theol.  d.  Propheten,  p.  47,  Anm,  4. 

2  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  233.  3  ibid.^  p.  287. 


Image -Worship  not  Mosaic.  223 

and  even  Kiienen  will  hardly  deny  that  Moses  had  at- 
tained to  the  notion  of  a  spiritual  God.  For  in  one 
passage,^  after  saying  that  Moses  may  have  shared  in 
the  ideas  of  a  somewhat  sensuous  character  held  as  to 
the  ark,  he  says  if  Moses  believed  that  the  ark  was  the 
abode  of  Jahaveh,  and  accordingly  offered  the  common 
sacrifices  before  it, 

"  then  he  himself  certainly  did  not  erect  an  image  of  Jaliveh, 
much  less  ordain  the  use  of  one.  We  are  inclined  to  go  a  step 
further.  May  we  not  conclude  from  the  fact  that  Moses  attached 
so  much  importance  to  the  ark,  tliat  the  images  of  Jahveh  did  not 
fully  harmonise  with  his  conception  of  Jahveh's  nature  and  char- 
acter ?  If  he  had  really  received  a  deep  impression  of  Jahveh's 
majesty,  and  of  the  vast  diffeience  between  Him  and  the  'other 
gods,'  is  it  not  extremely  natural  that  he  should  not  have  been 
altogether  satisfied  with  the  image  of  the  bull,  which  was  immedi- 
ately connected  with  the  usual  nature-worship,  and  led  men  again 
and  again  to  sink  into  it?  The  conclusion  is  easily  drawn,  Moses 
did  not  definitely  and  expressly  forbid  the  use  of  Jahveh  images. 
But  still  less  did  he  promote  it.  He  even  opposed  it  indirectly  by 
raising  the  aik  to  be  Israel's  central  sanctuary.  The  prohibition, 
'  thou  shalt  not  make  unto  thee  any  graven  image,'  was  not  decreed 
by  him,  but  at  a  much  later  period,  although  it  was  done  in  con- 
formity with  his  spirit," 

One  would  think  that  this  was  an  ample  admission 
that  image-worship  is  not  of  Mosaic  origin,  and  therefore 
not  a  part  of  the  genuine  Jahaveh  religion.  As  for  tlie 
brazen  serpent,  Kuenen  himself  does  not  lay  much  stress 
on  it,  for  on  his  view  the  account  of  it  cannot  be  accepted 
as  historical ;  and  even  if  the  Israelites  paid  reverence 
to  it,  this  does  not  prove  that  Moses,  if  he  made  it,  set 
it  up  for  that  purpose.  The  argument  drawn  from  the 
symbolism  about  the  Temple  fails  also  to  establish  the 
point,  for  it  is  confronted  by  one  hard  fact  which  makes 

1  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  289  f. 


224  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

for  the  opposite  conclusion.  Both  Yatke  and  Graniberg 
admit  that  one  great  feature  distinguishing  the  worship 
of  Jerusalem  from  that  of  the  northern  kingdom  was 
the  absence  from  the  Temple  of  any  image  of  Jahaveh. 
The  fact  is  the  more  significant  that  so  much  symbolism 
did  exist,  and  seems  to  emphasise  tlie  point  conceded 
above  by  Kuenen,  that  Moses  did  not  promote  image- 
worship.  Kuenen  also  admits  ^  that  the  ark  stood  where 
an  image  of  Jahaveh  should  have  stood,  but  does  not 
pretend  that  there  was  any  attempt  to  erect  such  an 
image.  On  the  contrary  he  says,  "  We  are  nowhere  told 
that  Jahveh  was  worshipped  under  any  visible  form  in 
the  Temple  at  Jerusalem;  it  is  much  more  likely  that 
from  the  very  beginning  that  Temple  was  dedicated  to 
the  service  of  the  invisible  Jahveh."  ^  He  tries  indeed  to 
make  out  that  such  images  existed  at  other  places  where 
Jahaveh  was  worshipped.  "  The  same  prophets,"  he  says, 
"  whose  complaints  of  the  heathen  practices  of  their 
countrymen  we  have  just  noticed,  testify  at  the  same 
time  to  the  fact  that  Jahveh  was  universally  honoured 
and  served.  Thus  it  is  very  possible,  and  even  probable, 
that  some  of  these  graven  images,  the  use  of  which  they 
deplored,  were  images  of  Jahveh."^  Wellhausen  also 
says  plainly,^  that  "  images  of  the  deity  were  exhibited  in 
all  the  three  places  (viz.,  Jerusalem,  Beth-el,  and  Dan), 
and  indeed  in  every  place  where  a  house  of  God  was  found." 
In  this  they  are  practically  following  Vatke,  who  reasoned,* 
from  Isa.  ii.  8,  that  if  the  land  of  Judah  was  full  of  idols, 
the  idol-worshippers  could  not  have  omitted  from  their 
list  the  greatest  or  one  of  the  greatest  of  their  gods, 
Jahaveh  himself.     It  is   a  mere  guess,  destitute  of  any 

1  Eelig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  236.  ^  j^j^j^  p^  go.  3  ibid.,  p.  80. 

4  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  406.  «  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  483. 


'Elijah  and  Elislia  and  the  Calf-  Worship.  225 

proof,  and,  in  face  of  the  striking  fact  in  regard  to  the 
Temple,  it  is  in  the  highest  degree  improbable.  We 
should,  on  Vatke's  reasoning,  have  concluded  that  if 
Jahaveh  was  to  be  represented  freely  by  an  image  at 
local  shrines,  a  fortiori  he  would  be  so  represented  in 
the  Temple.  Only,  the  facts  are  against  this  reasoning, 
and  much  reasoning  of  a  like  kind. 

But  it  is  said  there  are  direct  positive  proofs  that  a 
worship  of  Jahaveh  by  visible  images  was  common  and 
recognised  by  the  best  authorities.  Of  such  proofs  one 
is  the  passage  in  the  book  of  Judges,  in  which  a  grandson 
of  Moses  is  mentioned  as  exercising  idolatrous  priestly 
functions  at  Dan.  To  this  we  shall  recur  immediately 
in  speaking  of  the  epliod.  Let  us  now  look  at  other 
proofs  based  upon  the  practices  of  the  prophets  them- 
selves or  to  be  deduced  from  their  writings. 

It  is  maintained  by  the  modern  critics  that,  as  in  the 
legends  of  Elijah  and  Elisha  we  find  no  mention  of  a 
polemic  against  the  calf-worship  of  the  northern  kingdom, 
we  may  take  that  as  an  indication  that  these  prophets 
did  not  look  upon  it  as  inconsistent  with  the  true 
Jahaveh  religion.  As  for  the  words  of  Ahijah  the 
Shilonite,  whom  the  writer  of  Kings  introduces  as  de- 
nouncing Jeroboam  for  making  "  other  gods  and  molten 
images "  (1  Kings  xiv.  9),  these  are  set  down  as  "  the 
dressing  up  of  the  pragmatic  view  of  a  later  age " ;  and 
the  imprecation  of  the  unnamed  prophet  introduced  in 
the  same  book  (chap.  xiii.  1  ff.)  is  easily  got  rid  of  for  a 
similar  reason.  Letting  these  references  pass,  however, 
as  contained  in  a  book  written  long  after  the  time  to 
which  we  confine  ourselves,  we  take  the  admission  of 
Vatke  that  the  legends  of  the  prophets  Elijah  and  Elisha 
are,  comparatively  speaking,  correct.     Now  the  absence 

P 


226  Visible  Eeprescntations  of  the  D city. 

from  tliem  of  all  polemic  against  the  calves  may  be 
admitted  to  be  a  very  striking  circumstance,  since  it  is 
the  case  that  such  polemic  formed  a  prominent  and  con- 
stant element  of  prophetic  preaching.^  But  in  the  first 
place,  there  were  many  abuses  in  the  northern  kingdom 
about  wliich  we  hear  nothing  from  Elijah  and  Elisha.  It 
is  certainly  remarkable  that  we  do  not  find  either  of  these 
prophets  at  Beth-el  or  Dan,  the  seats  of  the  calf-worship, 
where  we  might  naturally  have  expected  them,  had  they 
regarded  these  as  the  seats  of  the  true  Jahaveh-worship 
of  the  time.  The  fact  of  their  keeping  aloof  from  these 
places,  and  forming  perhaps,  as  many  have  supposed, 
centres  of  religious  activity  around  which  the  piously 
minded  of  their  nation  could  gather  and  keep  clear  of 
the  prevailing  contamination,  would  tell  against  the  idea 
that  they  recognised  the  worship  of  Jeroboam's  sanctu- 
aries as  genuine.  But  above  all,  these  prophets  had  evtni 
a  harder  duty  to  perform  than  to  rebuke  the  calf-worship. 
That  worship,  degraded  as  it  was,  called  itself  a  worship 
of  Jahaveh,  and,  from  Jeroboam's  days,  may  have  kept 
the  recognition  of  the  national  God  of  Israel  in  a  w\ay 
prominently  before  the  people.  But  in  the  days  of  Ahab 
and  his  queen  Jezebel,  when  Elijah  flourished,  it  came  to 
be  a  question  whether  Jahaveh  or  the  Phoenician  Baal 
was  to  receive  recognition  as  the  national  god.  To  this 
great  question  Elijah  braced  himself,  and  sought  to  rouse 
the  undivided  co-operation  of  every  Israelite.  When  once 
that  danger  passed  away,  we  see  his  successors  direct- 
ing themselves  to  the  purification  of  the  Jahaveh  religion, 
which  had  gained  the  day.  The  two  crises  are  very  much 
like  those  which  Europe  passed  through  in  its  religious 
history — first  the  struggle  as  to  whether  the  Crescent  or 
,     .  Vatke,  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  400  f. 


Iloseas  Attitude  to  the  Calf-  Worshijp.  227 

the  Cross  should  be  the  recognised  symbol  of  superiority, 
and  then  the  Eeformation  of  religion  from  its  own  abuses 
in  the  sixteenth  century.  For,  as  has  just  been  said,  the 
earliest  writing  prophets  ^  are  found  denouncing  the  calf- 
worship  as  vigorously  as  Elijah  rebuked  the  worship  of 
Baal.  It  is  not  even  denied,  it  cannot  well  be  denied, 
by  the  most  advanced  writers  that  Hosea  at  least  takes 
up  this  attitude  to  the  worship  of  the  calves ;  and  his 
position  is  so  well  marked  in  this  respect  that  modern 
critical  writers  beat  about  the  bush,  but  in  vain,  for 
any  adequate  explanation  of  this  advance  over  the  non- 
writing  or  acting  propliets  who  immediately  precede 
him.  All  they  are  able  to  suggest  is,  that  in  the  course 
of  the  centuries  succeeding  Jeroboam  I.  idolatrous  ele- 
ments had  got  incorporated  with  the  primitive  Jahaveh 
calf  -  worship  —  elements  such  as  the  "  kissing  "  of  the 
images  referred  to  in  Hosea  xiii.  2,  1  Kings  xix.  18 — or 
that  the  worship  of  Jahaveh  and  the  idols  had  got  freely 
combined.^  This  mode  of  evading  the  difficulty  is  of  a 
piece  with  the  explanation  why  Amos  and  Hosea  have 
left  writings  while  none  of  the  prophets  before  them 
wrote  anything,  that  "  in  the  course  of  a  century  a  non- 
writing  had  developed  into  a  literary  age."  The  contrast 
is  too  sharp  to  be  slurred  over  in  this  way.  From  all 
that  is  recorded  of  Elijah,  we  may  more  reasonably  con- 
clude that  if  he  does  not  wage  polemic  against  the  calves, 
it  is  because  his  polemic  was  directed  against  much  more 
than  that  form  of  idolatry. 

In  regard  to  Amos  a  very  singular  position  has  been 
taken  by  many  modern  writers.     Since  this  prophet  does 

^  Amos  iv.  4,  v.  5,  vii.  9  ff.,  viii.  14  ;  Hosea  viii.  5,  xiii.  2. 
2  See  Vatke,  p.  401  f.  ;  Kuenen,  Relig.  of  Israel,  i.  78  f.j  Stade  in  his 
Ztsch.  fiir  die  ATliche  Wisseuschaft,  1883,  p.  9  f. 


228  Visible  Eeprcsentations  of  the  Deity, 

not  expressly  reprobate  the  calf -worship,  it  has  been  taken 
for  granted  that  he  too,  like  Elijah,  saw  nothing  wrong  in 
it.  This  view,  says  Dr  A.  B.  Davidson,  has  been  repeated 
so  often,^  that  it  may  be  called  traditional ;  and  I  will 
allow  Dr  Davidson  in  his  own  way  to  exhibit  its  super- 
ficiality. "It  is  questionable,"  he  says,  "if  this  represen- 
tation be  true,  even  in  the  letter.  Several  passages  are 
hard  to  reconcile  with  it,  as  this :  *  When  I  visit  the 
transgressions  of  Israel  upon  him  I  will  also  visit  the 
altars  of  Beth-el ;  and  the  horns  of  the  altar  shall  be  cut 
off,  and  fall  to  the  ground '  (iii.  14)  ;  ^  or  the  ironical  in- 
vitation, '  Go  to  Beth-el,  and  transgress '  (iv.  4) ;  or  this, 
'They  that  swear  by  the  sin  of  Samaria  (probably  the 
calf  of  Beth-el),  and  that  swear.  As  thy  God,  0  Dan, 
liveth,  shall  fall,  and  never  rise  up  again  (viii.  14);  or 
the  graphic  picture  of  the  worshippers  gathered  together 
in  the  temple  at  Beth-el,  which  Jehovah  smites  and  brings 
down  upon  their  heads.  These  passages  appear  to  carry 
in  them  a  formal  repudiation  of  the  calves.  Minds  may 
differ,  but  if  the  prophet's  language  be  not  a  verbal  pro- 
test against  the  calf- worship,  it  is  because  it  is  a  great 
deal  more ;  it  is  a  protest  which  goes  much  deeper  than 
the  calves,  and  is  directed  to  something  behind  them. 
The  calves  and  the  whole  ritual  service  as  it  was  prac- 
tised, were  but  symptoms  of  that  which  gave  offence  to 
the  prophet,  which  was  the  spirit  of  the  worship,  the 

^  See,  e.g.,  Clieyne  on  Hosea  (Cambridge  Bible  for  Schools),  p,  31  ; 
Robertson  Smith,  Prophets,  p.  175  ;  Stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  579. 

2  Shall  we  conclude,  perhaps,  from  iii.  14,  where  the  horns  of  the  altar 
are  to  be  cut  off,  that  in  the  view  of  Amps  the  altar  itself  is  to  be  allowed 
to  stand  ?  Wellhausen  reasons  in  this  way  from  a  passage  of  Isaiah,  where 
molten  and  graven  images  are  condemned,  that  the  local  sanctuaries  in 
which  these  are  contained  are  not  to  be  included  in  the  condemnation. — 
VVellh.,  Hist.,  pp.  25,  46.     See  below,  chap.  xvii.  p.  450, 


The  Eplwd.  229 

mind  of  the  worshippers,  the  conception  of  the  Deity 
which  they  had  in  worshipping,  and  to  which  they  offered 
their  worship."  ^ 

11.  Let  us  see  now  the  argument  drawn  from  the  use 
of  the  ephod.  It  is  argued  that  the  word  ephod,  besides 
being  employed  to  denote  the  breast  -  covering  of  the 
priest,  was  also  the  name  of  an  image,  and  that  such 
an  image  was  set  up  by  Gideon  at  Ophrah,  and  used 
by  David  for  worship.  It  is  certainly  at  the  first  sight 
remarkable,  if  this  be  the  case,  that  the  same  word  should 
denote  two  things  so  very  different,  and  it  is  important 
to  determine  if  possible  which  of  the  two  significations 
is  the  primary  one,  and  how  one  word  could  have  come 
to  have  the  two  senses.  There  is  one  passage  (Isa.  xxx.  22) 
in  which  a  derivative  of  the  word  ephod  (^apliitddah)  is 
applied  not  to  the  dress  of  the  priest,  but  to  some  part  of 
an  image ;  and  the  use  of  that  word  will  perhaps  guide  us 
to  the  truth.  In  tliat  verse  we  read :  "  Ye  shall  defile  the 
overlaying  of  thy  graven  images  of  silver,  and  the  plating 
(aphioddath)  of  thy  molten  images  of  gold  "  (E.V.)  Here 
the  parallelism  shows  that  the  word  in  question  does  not 
denote  the  image  itself,  but  a  part  of  it,  answering  in  the 
other  half  of  the  verse  to  "  overlaying."  If  we  render  this 
word  "  coating,"  it  would  be  an  obvious  derivative  of 
ephod  in  the  sense  of  "coat"  or  dress.  In  fact  the  same 
derivative  is  used  (Exod.  xxviii.  6  ff.),  when  directions 
are  given  for  the  making  of  the  priestly  ephod.  It 
was  to  be  of  "  gold,  of  blue,  and  purple,  and  scarlet, 
and  fine  twined  linen,  the  work  of  the  cunning  work- 
man ; "  and  (in  ver.  8)  it  is  directed  that  "  the  curious 
girdle  of  the  ephod  [according  to  A.V.,  or,  as  better  ex- 
pressed in  E.V.,  the  cunningly  woven  band],  which  is 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  175. 


230  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

upon  it,  shall  be  of  the  same."  The  ephod  here  described 
was  evidently  of  rich  material,  provided  with  a  girdle  for 
tying  it,  and  the  verb  from  which  the  noun  comes  is 
actually  employed  (Exod.  xxix.  5)  to  denote  the  girding 
on  of  the  dress.  Vatke,  indeed,  endeavoured  to  make  out  ^ 
that  as,  on  liis  view,  the  whole  account  of  the  arranixe- 
ments  for  the  giving  of  the  oracle  by  the  high  priest  is 
late,  we  cannot  draw  the  conclusion  that  the  ephod  was 
originally  and  exclusively  part  of  the  priestly  dress.  But 
he  has  himself  to  admit  that  the  wearing  of  a  linen  ephod 
is  distinctly  mentioned  in  the  books  of  Samuel,  where  we 
have  the  boy  Samuel  (1  Sam.  ii.  18),  a  whole  company  of 
priests  at  Shiloh  (1  Sam.  xxii.  18),  and  David,  who  was 
not  a  priest  (2  Sam.  vi.  14),  wearing  ephods.  Therefore 
in  none  of  the  passages  quoted  —  not  even  that  from 
Isaiah — is  the  word  applied  to  an  image  as  such,  though 
it  may  be  applied  to  the  covering,  with  which,  in  the  form 
and  with  perhaps  an  imitation  of  the  magnificence  of  the 
priestly  ephod,  an  image  might  be  overlaid. 

But  it  is  said  that  the  ephod  placed  by  Gideon  in  his 
city  Ophrah  (Judges  viii.  27)  could  have  been  nothing  but 
an  image,  for  it  was  made  of  the  gold  that  was  taken  from 
the  Midianites.  In  the  first  place,  however,  we  are  told  that 
"  the  weight  of  the  golden  earrings  that  he  requested  was 
a  thousand  and  seven  hundred  shekels  of  gold ;.  beside  the 
crescents,  and  the  pendants,  and  the  purple  raiment  that 
was  on  the  kings  of  Midian,  and  beside  the  chains  that 
were  about  their  camels'  necks."  Here,  though  the  weight 
of  gold  is  certainly  great,  there  is  also  purple  raiment  that 
was  on  the  kings,  employed  along  with  the  metal  in  pro- 
viding the  ephod.  I  do  not  know  that  we  are  bound  to 
conclude  that  every  ounce  of  tho  gold  and  every  inch  of 

*  Bibl.  Theol,  p.  270,  Anm. 


Gideon's  Epliod.  231 

the  purple  was  employed  in  the  actual  construction  of  the 
ephod.  Whatever  was  made,  was  a  thing  of  magnificence, 
and  implied  costly  surroundings ;  but  it  is  not  by  all  this 
proved  that  ephod  means  an  image.  It  may  have  been 
merely  a  coat  of  extraordinary  magnificence,  so  heavy  that 
it  could  stand  alone,  as  we  say ;  it  may  have  been  placed 
upon  an  image ;  but  it  was  an  ephod,  and  an  ejohod,  as  far 
as  the  usage  of  the  language  tells  us,  was  a  coat  or  cover- 
ing. The  statement  that  follows  may,  of  course,  be  taken 
as  the  remark  of  tlie  pious  narrator  of  a  later  time,  that 
it  became  a  snare ;  but  there  must  be  truth  in  his  words 
that  Israel  went  a-whoring  after  it — viz.,  that  it  was  sought 
after  as  a  religious  instrument.  The  snare  may  have  been 
this :  As  the  ephod  was  the  dress  of  the  priest,  and  as  the 
priest  wearing  it  gave  forth  utterances  for  the  guidance  of 
the  people,  the  superstition  of  the  time  may  have  supposed 
that  from  such  a  magnificent  ephod,  kept  by  a  man  like 
Gideon,  who  still  desired  that  Jahaveh  directly  should 
rule  over  Israel  (viii.  23),  guidance  would  be  given  in  cases 
of  difficulty.  We  are  not  bound  to  make  Gideon  a  man 
of  perfect  understanding  of  such  things;  he  may  have 
thought  that  his  ephod  was  as  good  at  least,  and  able  to 
furnish  as  good  guidance,  as  those  employed  at  the  decay- 
ing sanctuary  of  Shiloh.  The  only  point  we  are  concerned 
with  now  is  to  show  that  the  ephod  was  not  an  image 
representing  the  national  God  of  Israel.  Some  more  light 
is  thrown  on  this  subject  by  the  story  of  Micah  (Judges 
xvii.,  xviii.)  In  that  story  we  read  that  besides  the 
"  graven  image  and  the  molten  image  "  the  "  man  Micah 
liad  an  house  of  gods,  and  he  made  an  ephod,  and  teraphim, 
and  consecrated  one  of  his  sons,  who  became  his  priest." 
Here  also  the  ephod  may  be — most  probably  is — nothing 
else  than  the  priestly  dress.    The  anxiety  of  Micah  to 


232  ,  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity 

have  a  regularly  qualified  Levite  to  be  his  priest  comes 
out  at  every  step  in  the  narrative;  and  the  confidence 
both  on  his  part  and  on  the  part  of  the  Danites  that  such 
a  priest  would  give  unerring  guidance,  is  quite  childlike 
(chaps,  xvii.  10-13;  xviii.  4-6,  19,  24,  30).  As  the  priest 
was  the  wearer  of  the  ephod,  the  providing  of  an  ephod  ne- 
cessitated the  procuring  of  a  priest.  For  want  of  a  better, 
Micah  sets  apart  his  son  to  perform  the  priestly  functions, 
but  as  soon  as  he  can  lay  hands  on  a  genuine  Levite  he 
instals  him  into  tlie  office ;  and  the  direction  sought  from 
him  by  the  Danites  is  exactly  tlie  kind  of  guidance  which 
the  priest  wearing  an  ephod  was  in  the  habit  of  giving. 
In  any  case  we  should  not,  of  course,  take  Micah  and 
the  wandering  Danites  as  the  representatives  of  the  true 
Jahaveh  religion  even  in  that  rude  age,  nor  regard  the 
conduct  even  of  Gideon  as  justifiable.  Yet  we  do  not 
find  in  these  passages  any  proof  that  the  ephod  was  taken 
to  be  a  symbol  of  Jahaveh,  even  by  Micah  with  his  house 
of  gods,  much  less  that  Gideon  regarded  his  ephod,  what- 
ever its  shape,  as  the  embodiment  of  the  national  God  who 
had  made  him  victorious  over  the  Midianites.  In  connec- 
tion with  the  story  of  Micah,  it  is  mentioned  (xviii.  30) 
that  "  Jonathan,  the  son  of  Gershom,  the  son  of  Manasseh, 
he  and  his  sons,  were  priests  to  tlie  tribe  of  Dan  until  the 
day  of  the  captivity  of  the  land  "  [or  of  the  ark].  It  is  well 
known  that  the  name  Manasseh  has  been  produced  in  this 
passage  by  the  insertion  of  a  letter  to  disguise  the  fact 
that  the  name  was  originally  Moses.  And  much  has  been 
made  of  the  fact  that  a  grandson  of  the  lawgiver  himself 
is  here  represented  as  at  the  head  of  the  idolatrous  wor- 
ship of  the  Danites — a  proof,  as  it  is  taken  to  be,  that 
there  was  nothing  in  the  original  Mosaic  religion  opposed 
to  the  practice  of  image- worship.     Not  only  so ;  but  the 


The  JForship  at  Ban.  2'33 

case  of  this  misguided  youth,  though  it  is  specially  noted, 
and  though  it  occurred  in  a  degenerate  time,  is  made  an 
example  of  the  rule  that  was  common  throughout  the 
land.  So  Eobertson  Smith  says:^  "In  many*places  a 
priesthood,  claiming  kinship  with  Moses,  administered  the 
sacred  oracle  as  his  successors."  It  seems  to  me  that  this 
whole  story  of  the  Danites  is  given  by  the  historian  not 
because  it  was  a  sample  of  what  was  common,  but  because 
there  was  something  uncommon  and  abnormal  in  the  pro- 
ceeding. The  various  judges  whose  exploits  are  recorded 
are  not  specimens  of  the  ordinary  Israelite  of  this  period, 
nor  were  men  all  up  and  down  the  country  killing  multi- 
tudes with  the  jawbone  of  an  ass,  and  routing  hordes  of 
Midianites  with  lamps  and  trumpets.  And  why  go  so  far 
afield  as  Dan,  if  the  writer  wished  to  tell  us  what  was 
done  in  Moses'  name,  and  by  his  authority  ?  Dan  was  in 
historic  time  the  seat  of  a  worship  which  was  particularly 
obnoxious  and  vigorously  denounced  by  the  prophets ;  and 
the  writer  of  the  story  in  the  book  of  Judges  traces  the 
idolatry  back  to  the  time  at  which  it  was  set  up,  and 
perhaps,  in  giving  the  name  of  Moses'  grandson,  hints  at 
one  reason  why  it  had  its  evil  prestige — viz.,  that  it  could 
boast  of  the  priesthood  of  men  of  Mosaic  descent.  So  far 
from  taking  these  incidents  as  types  of  the  everyday  life 
and  action  of  the  nation,  I  would  be  disposed  to  think  that 
the  writer,  like  most  early  writers,  singled  out  for  record 
things  that  were  uncommon,  leaving  ordinary  events  un- 
recorded. The  very  things  in  regard  to  which  we  search 
the  Old  Testament  in  vain  for  information,  are  precisely 
those  that  must  have  been  so  regular  that  they  were  not 
thought  worthy  of  notice. 

I  do  not  think  it  will  commend  this  view  of  the  ephod 

1  Prophets,  p.  38. 


234  Visible  Eepresentations  of  the  Deity. 

to  the  ordinary  reader  of  the  Bible  to  be  told,  as  Vatke 
tells  us,  that  Gideon's  ephod  had  "  probably  the  form  of  an 
ox,  or  that  of  a  combination  of  an  ox  and  a  man ; "  ^  and 
also  that  David's  ephod  "  had  in  all  probability  also  the 
form  of  an  ox."  ^  The  ephod  symbolism  is,  no  doubt,  found 
connected  with  the  calf- worship,  although  in  the  mention 
of  the  calves  there  is  not  a  word  about  the  ephod,  nor  is 
there  any  hint  of  Gideon  having  got  the  idea  of  his  ephod 
from  Egypt  or  elsewhere.  But  if  David  used  an  ephod 
which  was  in  the  form  of  an  ox,  it  is  difficult  to  see  in 
what  respect  Jeroboam's  setting  up  of  calves  should  have 
been  a  deviation  from  normal  Israelitish  worship,  or  even 
a  distinction  of  the  northern  kingdom.  There  recurs 
again  the  admitted  fact  that  in  Solomon's  temple  there 
was  no  image  of  Jahaveh;  and  it  is  simply  incredible 
that  Solomon  should  have  made  such  an  advance  upon 
his  father  David  without  the  writer's  ever  giving  the  least 
hint  of  it,  The  evidence  in  support  of  this  view^  of  the 
ephod  cannot  be  very  strong,  since  Kuenen  gives  two 
divergent  accounts  of  it.  Thus  at  one  place  ^  he  says 
it  is  "  very  probable  "  that  Jahaveh  had  been  worshipped 
under  the  form  of  a  bull  during  the  period  of  the  Judges, 
and  gives  references  for  the  statement  to  these  cases  of 
Gideon  and  Micah  (Judges  viii.  27,  xvii.  4).  And  this 
view  is  adopted  in  his  later  work,  '  National  Eeligions,' 
in  which  he  says,*  "  The  old  records  themselves  make  it 
probable  that  the  ephod  was  an  image  of  Jahveli,  silvered 
or  gilt  over,  and  perhaps  so  constructed  that  the  lots 
could  be  concealed  within  it."  In  the  same  place,  how- 
ever, he  gives  a  reference  to  his  earlier  work,^  where  this 
very  view  is  "  decidedly  to  be  rejected,"  and  the  opinion 

1  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  268.         2  ibid.,  p.  4OI.         »  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  236. 
*  National  Religions,  p.  82.  ^  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  [>.  100. 


Maggebas  and  Asherim.  235 

is  given  that  "it  is  very  improbable  that  an  expression 
so  much  in  use  should  have  been  employed  in  a  double 
sense ;  and,  as  our  preceding  investigation  teaches  us, 
it  is  absolutely  unnecessary  to  attach  any  other  meaning 
to  it  than  that  of  '  a  garment  worn  by  the  priest  upon  his 
shoulders.' "  And  this  is  the  conclusion  of  all  the  pother. 
An  Arabic  saying  tells  of  a  grammarian  who,  "  after  enor- 
mous labour,  explained  that  water  meant  water." 

III.  In  this  connection,  we  must  not  omit  reference  to 
the  Maggehas  or  pillars,  and  the  Asherim,  rendered  in  E.V. 
"  groves,"  but  probably  posts  or  images  of  Astarte,  which 
are  so  often  reprobated  by  prophetical  men  as  adjuncts  of 
tlie  corrupt  worship.  It  has  generally  been  admitted  that 
these  were  some  of  the  corruptions  introduced  into  tlie 
pure  national  religion  ;  and  Vatke,^  e.g.,  believed  that  the 
reform  of  Hezekiah  (2  Kings  xviii.  4,  22)  not  only  swept 
away  the  images  of  Jehovah,  but  extended  also  to  the 
Ma^Qebas  and  the  Asheras  which  existed  in  his  time 
(Isaiah  xvii.  8).  In  this  opinion  he  was  followed  by 
Kuenen^  and  Duhm.^  Of  recent  time,  however,  Stade 
has  taken  a  step  in  advance,  denying*  that  the  reforms 
of  Hezekiah  went  beyond  the  destruction  of  the  brazen 
serpent,  and  the  removal  of  the  images  of  Jahaveh,  which, 
he  concludes  from  the  words  of  Isaiah,  "  must  have  been 
found  in  the  hands  of  many  private  persons."  As  for  the 
MaQQebas  and  Asheras,  which  had  grown  up  out  of  the 
reverence  for  external  objects,  stone-worship  and  tree-wor- 
ship— that  is  to  say,  were  remnants  of  the  old  animistic 
religion — the  prophets  took  no  offence  at  them.  In  other 
words,  these  things  were  part  of  the  authorised  or  un- 
disputed religion  of  Israel.     The  passage   which  Vatke 

1  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  482.  2  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  80  ff. 

3  Thcol.  d.  Propheten,  p.  195.  *  Stade's  Ztsch.  1883,  pp.  914.  , 


236  Visible  Bepresentatiojis  of  the  Deity, 

had  relied  on  for  his  statement  that  these  things  were 
also  removed  by  Hezekiah,  stands,  however,  in  Stade's 
way.  That  passage  reads  (Isa.  xvii.  7,  8),  "  In  that  day 
shall  a  man  look  unto  his  Maker,  and  his  eyes  shall  have 
respect  unto  the  Holy  One  of  Israel.  And  he  shall  not 
look  to  the  altars,  the  work  of  his  hands,  neither  shall  he 
have  respect  to  that  which  his  fingers  have  made,  either 
the  asherim  or  the  sun  images."  Stade's  usual  critical 
instrument — the  pruning-knife — comes  to  his  hand ;  and 
he  declares  that  the  words  "  altars  "  and  "  asherim  "  and 
"sun  images"  are  interpolations  by  a  later  wordy  glos- 
sator, and  that  the  verse  originally  ran — "He  shall  not 
look  to  the  work  of  his  hands,  neither  shall  he  have 
respect  to  that  which  his  fingers  have  made."  It  is 
certainly  very  remarkable  that  a  mere  glossator  should 
have  understood  altars  particularly  as  the  work  of  a  man's 
hands.  The  use  of  that  word,  instead  of  some  name  of 
a  more  superstitious  object,  is  pretty  good  proof  that 
Isaiah  himself  wrote  it;  and  if  he  did,  the  parallelism 
justifies  the  other  words  in  the  second  half  of  the  verse. 
But  there  is  another  passage,  in  Micah  v.  13  f.,  which 
also  condemns  these  objects ;  and  as  the  verses  cannot  be 
emended,  they  are  in  the  block  declared  to  belong  to  a 
later  period.  The  verses  run :  "  I  will  cut  off  thy  graven 
images,  and  thy  pillars  out  of  the  midst  of  thee ;  and  thou 
shalt  no  more  worship  the  work  of  thine  hands.  And  I 
will  pluck  up  thine  asherim  out  of  the  midst  of  thee,  and 
I  will  destroy  thy  cities."  This  mode  of  proceeding  is 
only  an  example  of  pushing  a  foregone  conclusion.  In  a 
case  like  the  present,  where  positive  statements  are  not 
numerous,  and  where  these  critics  themselves  have  be- 
forehand with  confidence  appealed  to  the  prophetical 
writings  as  the  only  reliable  authorities,  to  cut  and  carve 


An  Altai'  in  the  Land  of  Egypt,  237 

them,  on  the  mere  grounds  of  the  hypothesis,  is  the  best 
refutation  of  the  hypothesis  itself. 

But  there  is  one  passage — and  it  is  the  only  one — that 
is  adduced  by  one  writer  after  another  to  prove  that 
beside  the  altars  of  Jahaveh  pillars  were  set  up  in  His 
honour :  "  In  that  day  there  shall  be  an  altar  to  the  Lord 
in  the  midst  of  the  land  of  Egypt,  and  a  pillar  (Mag^eba) 
at  the  border  thereof  to  Jahaveh"  (Tsa.  xix.  19).  Let 
not  the  English  reader  suppose  that  the  "  border  thereof  " 
is  the  border  of  the  altar;  there  is  no  doubt  that  it  is 
the  border  of  Egypt.  The  prophet  thus  foretells  that  in 
the  midst  of  the  land  of  Egypt  there  shall  be  an  altar  to 
the  Lord ;  and  at  the  border  of  Egypt  there  shall  be  a 
pillar  to  the  Lord.  The  conclusion  is,  that  close  beside 
every  altar  of  Jahaveh  in  Palestine  stood  also  a  pillar 
dedicated  to  Him;  and  this  is  the  kind  of  argument 
adduced  to  prove  that  the  setting  up  of  pillars  beside 
Jahaveh's  altars  was  part  of  the  recognised  worship. 
The  argument,  like  many  more  of  its  kind,  gives  proof 
of  great  ingenuity,  but  will  hardly  commend  itself  to 
sober  reason  as  any  proof  at  all.  The  prophet  goes  on 
to  say,  "  It  shall  be  for  a  sign  and  for  a  witness  unto 
the  Lord  of  hosts  in  the  land  of  Egypt ; "  and  what  he 
seems  to  mean  is,  that  as  the  altar  shall  be  for  true 
worship  in  the  heart  of  Egypt  itself,  at  which  the 
Egyptians  "  shall  worship  with  sacrifice  and  oblation,  and 
shall  vow  a  vow  unto  the  Lord,  and  shall  perform  it " 
(v.  21),  so  the  pillar  at  the  border  shall  be  a  mark 
indicating  that  the  whole  land  is  devoted  to  the  Lord. 
The  pillar  in  itself  was  no  idolatrous  object;  it  was  a 
memorial,  or  commemorative  mark,  and  as  such  we  fre- 
quently read  of  it  in  the  early  history.  If  superstition 
turned  the  simple  usage  to  a  wrong  purpose ;  if,  especially, 


238  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

the  pillars  set  np  beside  Canaanite  altars  were  imitated 
by  the  people  in  their  aping  of  Canaanite  idolatries,  that 
does  not  prove  that  pillars  were  part  of  the  original 
Jahaveh  worship,  much  less  that  they  were  in  any  sense 
symbols  of  Jahaveh  Himself. 

There  is  still  another  passage  which  is  relied  upon  to 
prove  that  pillars,  ephod,  and  teraphim  were  all  together 
parts  of  the  genuine  Israelite  religion;  but  if  I  under- 
stand the  passage,  it  proves  the  very  opposite  of  what  it 
is  adduced  to  support.  In  Hosea  iii.  4  we  read:  "For 
the  children  of  Israel  shall  abide  many  days  without 
king,  and  without  prince,  and  without  sacrifice,  and  with- 
out pillar,  and  without  ephod  or  teraphim,"  The  passage 
is  one  of  threatening,  and  the  inference  generally  drawn 
from  it  is,  that  as  the  things  mentioned  are  to  be  taken 
from  Israel  as  a  punishment,  they  are  to  be  regarded  as 
things  of  which  they  were  beforetime  lawfully  possessed. 
They  were,  in  a  word,  to  be  deprived  of  both  political 
freedom  and  religious  privileges;  and  as  the  former  is 
denoted  by  king  and  prince,  the  latter  is  summed  up  in 
the  succeeding  expressions,  which  therefore,  at  Hosea's 
time,  denoted  legitimate  elements  of  their  worship.  This 
interpretation,  however,  though  looking  plausible  enough, 
does  not  satisfy  the  context,  and  leaves  the  passage 
without  the  point  which  the  prophet  gave  to  it.  We 
have  to  go  back  to  the  beginning  of  the  chapter  to  see 
what  he  is  driving  at.  The  prophet  is  instructed  to  take 
back  his  erring  wife,  the  image  of  Israel  estranged  from 
its  God ;  he  buys  her  from  her  late  paramour,  and  then 
comes  the  passage  which  explains  all :  "  I  said  unto  her, 
Thou  shalt  abide  for  me  many  days ;  thou  shalt  not  play 
the  harlot,  and  thou  shalt  not  be  any  man's  wife :  so  will 
I  also  be  towards  thee."    This  last  phrase  naturally  means, 


Interpretation  of  Hosea  Hi,  4:,  239 

as  it  is  usually  expounded,  that  the  prophet  was  to  keep 
his  wife  both  secluded  from  her  lovers  and  separated  from 
himself  for  many  days — i.e.,  she  was  brought  to  his  house, 
but  kept  in  a  kind  of  imprisonment  till  she  should  come 
to  a  better  mind.  The  point  is,  tliat  she  would  neither 
enjoy  the  lawful  company  of  her  own  husband  nor  the 
unlawful  company  of  her  paramours.  Says  Eobertson 
Smith :  ^  "  In  V.  3  the  sense  seems  to  be  that  for  many 
days  she  must  sit  still,  not  finding  a  husband  (Jer.  iii.  1), 
— not  merely,  as  A.Y.,  not  marrying  another,  but  not  en- 
joying the  rights  of  a  lawful  wife  at  all — while  at  the 
same  time  Hosea  is  'toward  her,'  watching  over  and 
waiting  for  her  (the  phrase  is  as  2  Kings  vi.  11 ;  Jer.  xv. 
1.  Cf.  Hos.  i.  9)."  And  then  comes  the  application  : 
"  For  the  children  of  Israel  shall  abide  many  days  with- 
out king,"  &c.  They  also  should  endure  a  time  when 
neither  would  the  favour  of  God  be  shown  to  them,  nor 
the  help  of  false  gods  avail  them.  And  the  enumeration 
of  the  things  that  follow  should,  on  this  interpretation, 
exhibit  this  double  reference.  The  things  are  in  fact 
arranged  in  pairs,  and  I  think  light  at  once  falls  upon 
the  passage  when  read  in  this  connection,  each  pair  repre- 
senting at  once  the  true  and  the  false,  the  good  and  the 
evil,  of  which  they  would  be  deprived — 

Neither  king  nor  prince. 

Neither  sacrifice  nor  pillar. 

Neither  ephod  nor  teraphim. 

"Afterwards,"  says  the  prophet,  "shall  the  children  of 
Israel  return  and  seek  the  Lord  their  God,  and  David 
their  king."  Konig's  explanation  ^  of  the  passage,  which 
makes   the  whole   list   of  possessions   consist   of   things 

^  Prophets,  p.  410.  ^  Hauptprobleme,  p.  69. 


240  Visible  Representations  of  the  Deity. 

irregular  (even  the  monarchy),  seems  forced  in  itself, 
besides  failing  to  present  the  striking  idea  of  the  im- 
mediate context.  Eobertson  Smith,^  who  takes  sacrifice 
and  maQQeba,  ephod  and  teraphim,  to  have  been  "  recog- 
nised as  the  necessary  forms  and  instruments  of  the 
worship  of  Jehovah,"  yet  in  a  note  makes  the  double 
reference :  "  So  Jehovah  will  deal  with  Israel  when,  by 
destroying  the  state  and  the  ordinances  of  worship.  He 
breaks  off  all  intercourse,  not  only  between  Israel  and 
the  Baalim,  hut  between  Israel  and  Himself"  There  is  no 
reason  to  say  that  the  monarchy  in  itself  was  distasteful 
to  Hosea,  or  that  sacrifice  in  itself  was  condemned  by 
him.  But  if  we  take  the  things  in  pairs,  we  get  the 
legitimate  monarchy  and  the  bastard  lordship,  legitimate 
sacrifices  and  those  with  which  the  idolatrous  pillars 
were  associated,  the  legitimate  priestly  ephod  and  the 
superstitious  consulting  of  teraphim. 

1  O.T.  in  Jewish  Church,  Lect.  viii.  pp.  226,  423. 


241 


CHAPTER    X. 

PRE-PEOPHETIC  EELIGION  CONTINUED:    MOLOCII-WORSHIP — 
HUMAN   SACRIFICES — FIRE-WOESIIIP. 

Statements  of  Kuencn,  Daumer,  and  Ghillany  that  Jahaveh  was  originally 
a  fire  or  sun  god,  worshipped  with  human  sacrifices,  or  identified  with 
Moloch  —  Semitic  mode  of  naming  deities  contrasted  with  Aryan^ 
Arguments  for  identification  drawn  from  (1)  modes  of  expression,  fire, 
d-c,  metaphor;  (2)  Bamoth  ;  (3)  circumcision  and  offering  of  first-horn  ; 
(4)  certain  records  of  events— q.^.,  offering  of  Isaac ^  JephthaKs  daughter, 
king  of  Moab  ;  (5)  declarations  of  the  propthcts,  Amos  v,  26,  Micah  vi. 
7,  8 — "  Cumulative''  argument  from  these  indications — Warning  against 
jiroving  too  much, 

KuENEN,  after  concluding  that  the  bull  was  "an  in- 
digenous and  original  symbol  of  Jahveh,"  proceeds  to 
say :  ^  "  Now  we  know  from  other  sources  that  this 
emblem  had  its  place  in  the  worship  of  the  sun.  The 
bull  properly  symbolises  untamed  power,  especially  the 
violence  of  the  sun,  its  scorching  and  consuming  heat. 
Thus  Molcch  is  represented  with  the  head  of  a  bull,  while 
horns  are  the  invariable  tokens  of  Astarte.  Therefore 
we  certainly  do  not  go  too  far  in  inferring  from  the 
bull -worship  an  original  relationship  between  Jahveh 
and  Molech." 

1  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  236. 
Q 


24:2  Moloch -WorsJiip,  etc. 

It  may  seem  to  the  ordinary  reader  of  the  Bible  that 
only  by  extravagant  freaks  of  criticism  can  such  posi- 
tions be  maintained  as  the  following :  "  Fire  and  Moloch 
worship  was  the  ancestral,  legal,  and  orthodox  worship 
of  the  nation "  of  Israel.^  "  Moses  never  forbade 
human  sacrifices.  On  the  contrary,  these  constituted  a 
legal  and  essential  part  of  the  state  -  worship  from  the 
earliest  times  down  to  the  destruction  of  the  kingdoms 
of  Israel  and  Judah."^  And  it  is  no  doubt  the  case  that 
the  writers  from  whom  we  quote  went  a  greater  length 
than  more  modern  critical  writers  are  disposed  to  do. 
Kuenen,  e.g.,  in  reply  to  the  question  whether  the  Jahaveh 
of  the  prophets  is  a  counterpart  to  Moloch,  has  no  hesi- 
tation in  returning  a  negative  answer.  Still  he  fearlessly 
asserts  that  "  the  conception  of  Jahveh  originally  bordered 
upon  that  of  Molech,  or  at  least  had  many  points  of  con- 
tact with  it ; "  ^  and  that  "  originally  Jahveh  was  a  god 
of  light  or  of  the  sun,  and  the  heat  of  the  sun  and  the 
consuming  fire  were  considered  to  proceed  from  him,  and 
to  be  ruled  by  him.  In  accordance  with  this,  Jahveh 
was  conceived  by  those  who  worshipped  Him  to  be  a 
severe  being  inaccessible  to  mankind,  whom  it  was  neces- 
sary to  propitiate  with  sacrifices  and  offerings,  and  even 
with  human  sacrifices."  * 

In  order  to  the  clearer  understandiuGf  of  the  bearini>s 
of  this  question,  it  is  proper  to  remark  at  the  outset  that 
a  broad  distinction  is  to  be  observed  between  the  mode 
of  naming  of  their  gods  by  most  Semitic  peoples  and  that 


^  Title-page  of  Daumer's  Feuer  und  Molochdienst  der  alien  Hebriier, 
1842. 

2  Heading   to   p.    78   fF.    of  Ghillany's   Die   Mensclicnopfer   der   alten 
Hebriier,  1842. 

3  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  241.  •*  Ibid.,  p.  249. 


'' Nomina  Numina."  243 

of  Aryan  nations.  The  names  given  to  their  gods  by  tJie 
kindred  nations  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Israel  had  nearly 
all  a  similar  signification,  and  were  of  a  more  comprehen- 
sive import  than  the  usual  names  of  the  heathen  divini- 
ties. We  have  already  seen  that  Baal,  which  is  the  same 
name  as  the  Babylonian  Bel,  means  lord ;  so  does  Adon, 
which  passed  into  Adonis.  El  and  Elohim  had  a  similar 
general  meaning  of  power  or  might,  as  also  Shaddai ;  and 
Elyon  means  Most  High.  Moloch — or,  more  correctly, 
Molech — is  closely  akin  to  the  word  standing  for  king 
in  Hebrew,  and  signified  ruler  (perhaps  originally  in  an 
abstract  sense).  In  the  same  way,  Chemosh  seems  to 
be  derived  from  the  idea  of  subduing  or  repressing. 
Such  a  mode  of  nomenclature  is  different  from  that  of 
the  Aryans,  who  named  their  deities  from  single  natural 
phenomena,  as  fire,  light,  and  so  forth  ;  and  even  although 
the  Semitic  deities  were  associated  with  natural  pheno- 
mena of  that  kind,  the  names  preserved  their  general 
significance,  and  allowed  the  mind  of  the  worshipper 
a  wider  scope.  So  that  the  often  -  repeated  dictum, 
Nomina  numina,  however  applicable  to  Aryan  myth- 
ology,  is  not  found  prevailing  among  Semitic  peoples.^ 
It  is  this  peculiar  feature  of  Semitic  religion  that  led  M. 
Eenan  to  his  well-known  position  that  these  nations  had 
an  instinctive  leaning  to  monotheism ;  for  it  is  plain  that 
when  a  people  calls  its  god  the  rider,  the  Icing,  the  most 
high,  there  is  not  felt  the  same  necessity  for  gods  many, 
as  if  every  object  in  nature  was  the  abode  or  symbol 
of  a  special  deity.  A  people  keeping  to  such  general 
designations  of  the  deity,  is,  if  not  monotheistic,  on  tlie 
way  to  monotheism,  and  in  a  different  position,  e.g.,  from 
the  Assyrian  Semites,  who  multiplied  gods  with  the  use 

^  Baudissin,  Jahve  et  Moloch,  p.  9. 


244  Moloch-Worship,  etc. 

of  every  appellative  name.  The  discoveries  of  Assyri- 
ology  have  shown  that  a  Semitic  people  could  run  to  the 
same  excess  in  multiplying  deities  as  Aryan  nations ;  and 
mat  even  where  the  name  assigned  to  the  deity  was  of 
a  general  kind,  he  might  be  associated  with  fire,  light,  or 
heaven,  as  in  heathen  mythology.  M.  Eenan  has,  there- 
fore, now  so  far  modified  his  position  as  to  claim  a  mono- 
theistic instinct  for  only  the  nomad  Semitic  peoples.  At 
the  same  time,  the  feature  of  the  nomenclature  just  de- 
scribed has  to  be  kept  in  view,  for  it  furnishes  some 
explanation  of  the  possibility  some  have  found  of  iden- 
tifying the  God  of  the  Hebrews  with  the  gods  of  the 
surrounding  nations. 

The  precise  question  for  us,  now,  is  not  what  might  have 
been  done,  but  what  was  actually  done  in  times  of  which 
we  have  historical  knowledge.  "We  have  some  information 
as  to  the  character  ascribed  to  Moloch  by  his  worshippers, 
and  the  manner  in  which  he  was  worshipped.  What  we 
have  to  inquire  is,  whether  the  same  or  similar  qualities 
were  ascribed  by  the  Israelites  to  their  national  God,  and 
whether  they  paid  Him  similar  honours,  whether  even 
the  two  deities  were  so  far  identified  in  conception  as 
that  when  a  Hebrew  said,  Our  God  is  Melech,  he  meant 
to  imply  that  Jahaveh  was  the  same  as  the  deity  whom 
the  heathen  worshipped  as  Molech.  The  identification 
or  close  assimilation  of  the  two  deities  is  supposed  to  be 
made  out  by  a  consideration  of  certain  modes  of  speech, 
as  well  as  of  certain  ceremonies  or  practices  testified  to 
in  the  Hebrew  writings ;  by  the  record  of  certain  events, 
obscured  no  doubt  by  popular  tradition  or  prophetic 
leaching,  but  still  intelligible;  and  even  by  unequivocal 
statements  of  the  prophets  themselves.  We  have  there- 
fore to  consider  the  various  proofs,  and  see  whether  they 


The  Deity  as  a  Sun  or  Fire  God.  245 

are   substantiated  by   a   sober   exegesis  of   the   passages 
which  are  appealed  to. 

(1.)  To  begin  with  certain  expressions  or  modes  of  speak- 
ing of  God.  It  is  maintained  that  the  constant  application 
to  Jahaveh  of  language  denoting  fire  and  light  is  a  proof 
that  the  popular  conception  made  Him  a  sun  or  fire 
God,  so  that  He  was  not  distinguishable  from  Moloch.  The 
passages  in  which  this  mode  of  speech  is  employed  are 
too  numerous  to  be  quoted.^  Kuenen  adds,  "They  are 
too  numerous  to  be  looked  upon  as  accidental,  or  as  the 
result  of  arbitrary  choice ;  and  this  is  the  less  possible 
that  the  comparison  also  recurs  continually  beyond  the 
prophetic  literature  in  its  narrower  sense."  ^  He  then  refers 
to  the  glory  of  the  Lord  being  said  to  be  like  devouring 
fire  on  Sinai  (Exod.  xxiv.  17),  to  the  angel  appearing  in 
a  flame  of  fire  in  the  bush  (Exod.  iii.  2),  to  the  expres- 
sions "  a  consuming  fire,  a  jealous  God  "  (Deut.  iv.  24 ;  cf. 
ix.  3),  and  the  description  in  tlie  18th  Psalm  of  smoke 
going  up  out  of  His  nostrils,  fire  out  of  His  mouth  de- 
vouring (Psalm  xviii.  8),  &c.  He  is  careful  to  guard 
himself  by  saying^  that  of  course  the  pious  among  the 
Israelites,  in  using  these  expressions,  were  aware  that 
they  spoke  in  metaphor,  but  still  it  is  on  consideration 
of  such  passages  that  he  makes  the  assertion  we  have  al- 
ready quoted,  "  that  the  conception  of  Jahaveh  originally 
bordered  upon  that  of  Moloch,  or  at  least  had  many  points 
of  contact  with  it."  This  conclusion,  however,  is  warrant- 
able only  if  these  metaphorical  expressions,  when  orig- 
inally used,  were  not  regarded  as  metaphors  at  all,  but 

1  A  few  of  the  more  striking  may  be  noted :  Amos  i.  4,  7,  10,  12,  14, 
ii.  2,  5,  vii.  4 ;  Hos.  viii.  14  ;  Isa.  x.  17,  xxix.  6,  xxx.  27,  xxxiii.  14, — all 
"from  prophetic  Scriptures. 

2  Kelig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  240.  3  Ibid.,  p.  241. 


246  Moloch -Worship^  etc. 

plain  statements  of  fact.  For  I  do  not  think  Kuenen 
means  to  imply  that  the  original  conception  of  Moloch 
by  his  worshippers  was  that  of  a  spiritual  being  to  whom 
they  applied  these  expressions  in  a  metaphorical  sense. 
If,  however,  Kiienen  and  his  school  will  insist  upon  it 
that  metaphorical  language  must  originally  have  been 
used  as  plain  statement  of  fact,  then  the  essential  point 
in  dispute  is  assumed,  for  we  must  necessarily  admit 
that,  on  this  concession,  all  religious  thought  at  first  ex- 
presses itself  in  language  borrowed  from  material  things ; 
and  therefore  without  more  ado  we  may  say  that  all 
religion  begins  with  the  worship  of  material  things  or 
with  purely  materialistic  conceptions.  Stade,  in  speaking 
of  fetishism,  says  bluntly,^  "  Nothing  on  earth  begins  as  a 
symbol,  but  is  taken  as  a  reality."  I  should  think  that 
the  very  first  attempts  at  language  are  symbols,  and  con- 
sciously regarded  as  such  Language  is  the  effort  of  in- 
telligence to  express  itself;  but  if  a  savage  makes  a 
gesture  or  utters  a  cry,  he  knows  quite  well  that  that  is 
a  sign  and  symbol,  and  that  it  is  taken  by  his  fellow- 
savage  as  a  symbol  of  something  to  be  conveyed  from 
mind  to  mind.  It  is  simply  impossible  for  man  to  use 
language  in  regard  to  religious  feelings  and  ideas  without 
falling  into  metaphor;  even  the  current  phraseology  of 
Christianity  is  highly  metaphorical.  Will  Kuenen  or  any 
of  his  school  tell  us  what  expressions  in  any  language 
were  available,  when  consciousness  first  sought  to  express 
itself  on  these  subjects,  that  would  not  be  liable  to  similar 
misapprehension?  Holiness,  purity,  and  such  other  ex- 
pressions, in  the  most  elevated  diction  that  we  possess, 
come  back  to  be  properties  of  matter.  As  regards  the 
manifestations  of  Deity  with  the  accompaniments  of 
i  Gesch.,  vol.  i.  p.  405,  footnote  3. 


"  Original"  Conceptions.  247 

thunder,  lightning,  or  fire,  it  is  evident  that  if  such  theo- 
phanies  are  conceivable  at  all,  they  could  have  no  more 
striking  accompaniments.  And  as  to  the  use  of  language 
denoting  light,  it  need  only  be  remarked  that  as  the  sun 
is  the  most  striking  object  in  the  firmament,  the  one  source, 
as  it  seems  to  the  simple  primitive  mind,  of  light  and 
\varmtli,  pure,  exalted,  potent,  we  need  not  wonder  that  not 
only  Moloch-worshippers,  but  seekers  after  God  in  all  lands 
and  in  all  states  of  education,  have  taken  it  as  the  image  of 
the  great  and  holy  Being  after  whom  they  seek,  and  de- 
veloped their  religious  vocabulary  by  ringing  the  changes 
on  the  phrases  that  denote  its  unique  qualities.  No 
doubt  many  tribes  using  this  mode  of  speech  have  paid 
reverence  to  the  sun  itself;  but  it  requires  to  be  proved 
whether  this  is  the  "  original "  view  or  an  aberration ; 
and  at  all  events,  to  grant  that  Israel  did  the  same, 
because  they  used  the  same  mode  of  speech,  would  be,  as 
has  been  just  said,  to  concede  the  very  point  in  dispute. 
The  question  is.  To  what  precise  time  does  Kuenen  refer 
when  he  says  that  the  conception  of  Jahaveh  originally 
bordered  upon  that  of  Moloch  ?  If  it  was  the  time  when 
this  mode  of  speaking  of  God  first  came  into  use,  then 
we  may  be  driven  back  to  a  primitive  period  when  the 
earliest  of  the  Semitic  peoples  were  seeking  to  give  ex- 
pression to  religious  instincts;  and  the  phraseology,  so 
obvious  in  its  first  use,  and  so  expressive,  may  have  main- 
tained itself,  as  it  has  done  to  our  own  time,  without 
leading  to  misunderstanding.  There  is  a  transparent 
fallacy  underlying  all  this  kind  of  reasoning,  that,  if  a 
primary  meaning  can  be  fixed  to  a  term,  that  meaning 
may  be  held  to  adhere  to  the  term  at  whatever  time  it 
is  employed.  In  this  way  "original"  meanings  are 
attached  to  expressions  down  to  the  period  immediately 


248  Moloch- Worshi}!,  etc. 

preceding  the  writing  prophets,  or  even  later.  This  school 
of  thinkers  must  either  tell  us  what  kind  of  language 
could  have  been  employed  by  a  people  with  any  spiritual 
perceptions  at  all ;  or  they  must  simply  declare  that  no 
people  could  at  the  outset  entertain  any  conception  "of  a 
spiritual  kind,  which  is  to  beg  the  whole  question. 

(2.)  An  argument  for  the  identity  of  Jahaveh  and 
Moloch  has  been  drawn  from  the  practice  of  the  worship 
of  both  on  high  places  or  hamotJi ;  but  Kuenen  ^  sees  the 
weakness  of  the  argument,  and  lays  little  stress  upon 
it.  For  the  practice  is  so  common  and  obvious  in  all 
religions  that  it  can  prove  nothing.  In  my  opinion,  far 
too  much  has  been  made  of  the  practice  in  Israel,  as  if  in 
itself  it  was  more  sinful  to  worship  on  hills  than  on  plains, 
and  as  if  the  prophets  found  fault  with  it  for  the  mere 
situation.  It  was  the  associations  of  the  worship  with 
heathen  rites  and  superstitious  beliefs  that  made  it  obnox- 
ious, just  as  it  was  not  sacrifice  in  itself  but  unmeaning  or 
idolatrous  sacritice  which  the  prophets  condemned.  The 
quiet  of  the  mountain,  its  remoteness  from  the  busy  world, 
and  its  nearness  to  heaven,  would,  in  any  country  and  in 
any  age,  suggest  hallowed  thoughts  (we  cannot  forget  the 
custom  of  Him  who  went  up  into  a  mountain  to  pray,  and 
spent  all  the  night  in  prayer) ;  and,  given  a  place  made 
sacred  by  religious  sentiment,  the  aberrations  of  supersti- 
tion are  liable  to  follow.  So  the  shady  tree  and  the  cool 
sparkling  spring,  in  a  country  where  shadow  and  refresh- 
ing water  are  the  greatest  comforts,  would  irresistibly 
make  them  the  scene  of  quiet  reflection,  then  of  devotion, 
and  then  of  superstition.  People  in  our  colder  climates 
are  apt  to  forget  or  ignore  such  things ;  but  I  believe  the 
prophet,  who  reproved  the  worship  under  green  trees,  came 

^  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  241. 


Circumcision,  Dedication  of  First-horn.  249 

nearer  to  a  true  explanation  of  the  origin  of  the  worship 
in  tlie  hint,  "  because  the  shadow  thereof  is  good  "  (Hos. 
iv.  13),  than  modern  critics,  with  their  learned  disquisi- 
tions as  to  the  tree  suggesting  life  and  being  the  abode  of 
a  spirit  or  a  divinity. 

(3.)  We  come  now  to  consider  an  argument  for  the 
identity  of  Moloch  and  Jahaveh  drawn  from  the  observ- 
ances of  circumcision  and  the  dedication  of  the  first-born. 
These  practices,  though  toned  down  and  softened  into 
harmless  religious  ceremonies,  are  held  to  be  proofs  that 
Jahaveh  was  originally  regarded  as  a  bloodthirsty  being, 
not  the  preserver  of  life  but  its  destroyer,  identical  with 
Moloch.  Kuenen^  admits  that  he  has  here  very  little 
positive  proof  to  rely  upon,  and  even  indicates  certain 
considerations  that  might  be  construed  into  arguments 
against  his  own  position.  For  instance,  the  account  of 
the  institution  of  circumcision  (in  Gen.  xvii.)  might  be 
taken  to  prove  that  the  rite  was  "an  arbitrary  symbol  of 
dedication  to  Jahveh  " ;  but  this  account,  he  says,  is  "  late," 
and  "  we  do  not  at  all  see  why  this  particular  ceremony 
is  to  serve  as  a  token  of  the  covenant  between  El-Shaddai 
and  Abraham,  together  with  his  descendants."  He  also 
concedes  that  "  perhaps  its  meaning  was  afterwards  some- 
what modified,  and  it  was  looked  upon  as  a  purification 
by  which  the  Israelite  was  rendered  fit  to  draw  near  to 
Jahveh.  At  all  events,  it  is  remarkable  that  in  other 
nations  of  antiquity  it  was  only  performed  upon  the 
priests."  The  only  passage,  in  fact,  that  Kuenen  relies 
upon,  is  the  brief  passage,  Exod.  iv.  24-26,  "  When  Jahveh 
assails  Moses  and  seeks  to  kill  him,  his  wife  Zipporah 
circumcises  her  son  and  throws  the  foreskin  to  Jahveh, 
whereupon  the  latter  lets  Moses  go."    The  passage  is  very 

1  llelig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  238  f. 


250  Moloch- Worship,  etc. 

obscure,  the  text  itself  being  uncertain;^  but  whatever  it 
may  mean,  it  cannot  be  taken  as  a  proof  that  circumcision 
represents  an  old  custom  of  human  sacrifice.  It  may 
mean  that  an  uncircumcised  Hebrew  was  liable  to  death, 
but  that  is  quite  another  thing;  and  it  can  be  quite 
naturally  construed  to  mean  that  circumcision  was  in 
its  first  conception — as  Kuenen  admits  it  became  at  a 
later  date — a  symbol  of  purification  and  dedication  to 
Jahayeh.  His  admission  that  among  other  nations  of 
antiquity  it  was  only  performed  upon  the  priests,  might 
have  convinced  him  that  some  such  idea  was  fundamental: 
Daumer  as  usual  goes  further,  and  maintains^  that  cir- 
cumcision was  only  a  milder  substitution  of  castration, 
and  refers  to  such  a  custom  among  the  Hottentots.  He 
does  not,  however,  attempt  to  prove  that  Moloch-worship- 
pers practised  this  in  honour  of  their  god ;  nor  has  any 
one  shown  that  Moloch- worshippers  practised  even  cir- 
cumcision. Instead  of  reasoning  from  a  single  doubtful 
passage  and  general  considerations,  this  class  of  writers 
should  tell  us  when  this  precise  rite  took  the  place  of  hu- 
man sacrifice,  and  why  this  precise  rite,  so  unlike  human 
sacrifice,  should  have  been  substituted — a  rite  which  can 
be  so  obviously  explained  on  the  principle  that  the  deity 
claimed  the  sanctification  of  life,  not  its  destruction. 

By  precisely  the  same  kind  of  reasoning  it  is  sought  to 
be  made  out  that  the  dedication  of  the  first-born  to  Jahaveh 
is  a  remnant  of  an  older  custom  of  sacrificing  the  first-born. 
Kuenen  admits  here  again  that,  taken  alone,  the  custom 
may  be  classed  with  the  presentation  of  the  first-fruits  of 
the  earth,  as  an  act  of  acknowledgment  to  the  bountiful 

^  For  various  explanations,  see  the  Queen's  Printer's  Bible  on  the 
passage. 

^  J^'euer  und  Molochdienst,  p.  2*2. 


Sacrifice  of  the  First-horn.  251 

Giver  of  all  that  is  good,  the  source  of  all  fruitfiilness. 
But  he  maintains  that  the  historical  explanation  which  the 
Biblical  writers  give  of  the  origin  of  the  custom  (though  in 
his  view  it  is  not  historical)  is  in  favour  of  his  position. 
At  the  exodus  from  Egypt  Jahaveh  slew  the  first-born  of 
the  Egyptians,  but  spared  those  of  the  Israelites,  and  from 
that  period  the  first-born  in  Israel  belong  to  Him,  and  are 
either  sacrificed  in  His  honour  or  ransomed  from  Him. 
This  account  being  late,  we  can  only  conclude  from  it 
that  at  a  later  period  the  dedication  of  the  first-born  was 
brought  into  connection  witli  the  deliverance  from  the 
Egyptian  bondage.  "Yet  it  is  probable  that  while  this 
was  done,  the  original  meaning  of  tliis  custom  was  yet 
adhered  to  as  closely  as  possible.  But  in  that  case  Jahveh 
appears  here  again  as  a  severe  being,  who  must  be  pro- 
pitiated by  sacrifices,  and  induced  to  waive  his  right  to 
the  lives  of  men  and  beasts.  In  other  words,  we  have 
the  same  idea  of  the  character  of  the  Deity  which  lies  at 
the  root  of  the  dedication  of  the  first-born  and  of  human 
sacrifice."  ^  Now  it  must  seem  very  strange  that  at  a  late 
time,  when,  according  to  Kuenen's  view,  prophetic  influ- 
ence would  be  strongly  felt,  an  attempt  should  be  made 
by  bringing  this  custom  into  connection  with  the  deliver- 
ance from  Egypt,  to  adhere  to  the  original  meaning  of  the 
custom,  and  under  the  guise  of  an  unhistorical  story  as 
to  the  slaughter  of  Egypt's  first-born  to  explain  how  a 
rite  of  long  standing  in  Israel  was  originally  a  custom  of 
sacrificing  their  first-born.  Here  again  it  would  be  more 
to  the  point  to  tell  us  when  the  substitution  of  the 
milder  for  the  more  cruel  rite  took  place,  and  why,  the 
milder  rite  having  established  itself  (presumably  as  a 
better),  the  effort  should  have  been  made  to  keep  alive 

1  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  239  f. 


252  Moloch  -  Worship,  etc. 

the  remembrance  of  one  that  was  cruel  and  long  obsolete. 
Kuenen  says  truly,  that  in  regard  to  both  this  custom 
and  that  of  circumcision  we  should  look  for  a  reference 
to  the  nature  of  the  deity  to  whom  they  were  rendered  as 
religious  acts.  Now,  in  both  cases  the  ceremonies  are 
quite  as  reconcilable  with  the  nature  of  a  deity  who  was 
the  giver  and  defender  of  life,  as  with  that  of  one  who  was 
its  destroyer,  and  in  this  connection  the  parallel  custom 
of  offering  the  first-fruits  of  the  earth  should  not  be  over- 
looked. Moreover,  there  is  not  only  the  nature  of  the 
deity  to  be  considered,  but  the  effect  upon  the  mind  of 
the  worshipper.  And  both  rites,  if  taken  as  symbolical 
of  the  consecration  to  God  of  the  first  and  best  that  man 
has,  are  not  only  quite  in  keeping  with  all  the  Scriptural 
indications  which  we  possess,  and  consistent  with  those 
obscure  references  on  which  Kuenen  proceeds,  but  even 
very  significant  as  religious  acts  and  means  of  religious 
education.  The  thing  we  want  to  prove  is  the  nature 
of  the  deity  reverenced  in  these  services.  The  services 
in  themselves  do  not  suggest  a  deity  of  a  repulsive  char- 
acter, who  is  the  enemy  of  life,  but  are  thoroughly  in 
keeping  with  the  character  of  a  deity  such  as  the  Hebrew 
prophets  represented  their  national  God  to  be.  The  rites 
themselves,  confessedly  at  the  time  of  which  we  have  his- 
torical knowledge,  had  the  more  beneficent  associations. 

(4.)  We  next  come  to  consider  the  argument  drawn 
from  certain  records  of  alleged  events,  which,  though  ob- 
scured or  misinterpreted  by  the  narrators,  give  evidence,  it 
is  said,  that  human  sacrifice  to  Jahaveh  was  an  original 
custom  in  Israel,  and  that  therefore  the  God  of  Israel 
was  no  other  than  Moloch,  or  at  all  events  a  deity  of 
similar  character. 

We  begin  with   the   account   given  in  Gen.   xxii.    of 


Abraham's  Oj^ering  of  Isaac.  253 

Abraham's  offering  of  his  son  Isaac,  which  is  much  relied 
upon  in  this  connection,^  And,  not  to  take  an  extreme 
representation  of  the  view,  let  us  hear  the  rather  moder- 
ate statement  of  the  argument  by  Kuenen  :  ^  "  The  well- 
known  narrative  of  Abraham's  offering  .  .  .  does  not  by 
any  means  recommend  human  sacrifice,  but  the  disposi- 
tion evinced  in  the  sacrifice  of  a  child,  the  readiness  to 
give  up  even  the  most  precious  object  to  Jahveh,  is 
highly  extolled  by  the  author  (vers.  16-18) ;  if  Jahveh 
does  not  wish  that  disposition  to  be  confirmed  by  the 
deed  itself,  still  by  his  unqualified  praise  he  makes 
known  that  it  is  no  more  than  just  and  appropriate,  and 
that  what  he  does  not  desire  he  could  demand  from  his 
servant."  Now  it  seems  to  me  that  though  we  admit  all 
that  Kuenen  here  says,  we  are  as  far  as  ever  from  estab- 
lishing the  existence  of  the  custom  of  human  sacrifice; 
and  when  he  proceeds,  "  we  are  not  surprised,  therefore, 
that  human  sacrifice  appears  as  an  element  of  the  bull- 
worship  in  the  kingdom  of  the  ten  tribes,"  there  is  no 
connection  between  his  premises  and  his  conclusion.  We 
are,  to  be  sure,  warranted  in  concluding  from  the  narrative, 
that  the  narrator  knew  what  was  meant  by  the  offering 
of  human  sacrifice,  and  that  he  means  to  convey  to  us 
that  Abraham  understood  by  it  the  offering  of  the  very 
dearest  possession  to  Jahaveh.  But  we  ask,  if  such  offer- 
ings were  the  custom  in  the  writer's  day,  as  Daumer 
would  assert,  or  if  it  was  the  common  practice  in  the 
Abrahamic  stage  of  worship,  why  does  the  writer  make 
so  much  of  the  one  instance  of  it,  and  record  it  as  a 
singular  triumph  of  devotion  ?  If  we  may  be  allowed  for 
a  moment  to  suppose  that  there  is  historical  truth  in  the 
narrative  (in  other  words,  to  put  ourselves  in  the  position 

1  Daumer,  p.  34  ff.  ^  Rglig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  237. 


254  Moloch  -  Worship,  etc. 

of  the  narrator),  we  should  say  that  tlie  whole  story  ex- 
hibits not  only  the  faith  of  the  patriarch,  but  part  of  his 
education  in  the  spiritual  character  of  his  God.  Educa- 
tion by  contrast  is  one  of  the  most  effective  kind,  and 
the  Biblical  writers  make  us  familiar  with  it  by  their 
various  references  to  the  religious  beliefs  and  practices  of 
the  peoples  around  Israel,  and  in  such  injunctions  as,  "  So 
shall  ye  not  do  to  Jahaveh  your  God."  To  Abraham, 
not  unfamiliar  with  various  ways  in  which  among  his 
heathen  ancestors  the  deity  was  propitiated,  the  testing 
question  comes,  "  Art  thou  prepared  to  obey  thy  God  as 
fully  as  the  people  about  thee  obey  their  gods  ? "  and  in 
the  putting  forth  of  his  faith  in  the  act  of  obedience,  he 
learns  that  the  nature  of  his  God  is  different.^  Instead, 
therefore,  of  saying  that  the  narrative  gives  proof  of  the 
existence  of  human  sacrifice  as  an  early  custom  in  Israel, 
it  is  more  reasonable  to  regard  it  as  giving  an  explana- 
tion why  it  was  that,  from  early  time,  this  had  been  a 
prime  distinction  of  Israel  that  human  sacrifice  7vas  not 
practised  as  among  the  heathen.  The  fundamental  idea 
of  the  heathen  rite  was  the  same  as  that  which  lay  at  the 
foundation  of  Hebrew  ordinance,  the  best  to  God;  but  by 
presenting  to  us  this  story  of  the  offering  of  Isaac,  and 
by  presenting  it  in  this  precise  form,  the  writer  simply 
teaches  the  same  truth  taught  by  all  the  prophets,  that 
to  obey  is  better  than  sacrifice — in  other  words,  that  the 
God  worshipped  in  Israel  from  Abraham's  time  was  a 

^  In  a  similar  manner,  in  the  story  of  Abraham's  intercession  for  the 
cities  of  the  plain,  he  is  taught  the  merciful  character  of  the  God  to 
whom  he  prays.  It  is  a  shallow  view  of  this  narrative  to  represent  it 
as  a  hucKstering  proceeding,  in  which  the  suppliant  beats  down  the  deity 
to  the  lowest  point.  The  story  illustrates  the  Christian  truth,  "  Ac- 
cording to  your  faith  it  shall  be  done  to  you,"  for  as  long  as  Abraham 
Las  faith  to  pray  he  is  answered. 


Jephthah  and  his  Daughter.  255 

God  who  did  not  delight  in  destroying  life,  but  in  saving 
and  sanctifying  it. 

Just  as  little,  I  think,  does  the  story  of  Jephthali 
(Judges  xi.)  and  his  daughter  prove  that  human  sacrifice 
was  the  custom  in  Israel  at  the  time  of  the  Judges^ 
or  at  any  time.  Even  if  we  admit  that  Jephthah  con- 
templated the  possibility  or  probability  of  a  member 
of  his  household  being  the  first  to  come  out  to  meet 
him — even  if  we  admit  that  when  he  "  did  with  her 
according  to  his  vow  which  he  had  vowed"  (v.  39),  he 
actually  offered  her  as  a  sacrifice, — I  maintain  that  by 
any  sober  criticism  of  the  passage,  nothing  is  proved 
beyond  the  solitary  act.  No  doubt  we  must  admit  that 
Jephthah  may  have  been  acquainted  with  human  sacri- 
fice as  practised  by  the  nations  about  him.  The  writer 
of  the  narrative,  if  we  place  him  in  the  early  "  literary 
age  "  of  Israel,  could  not  but  have  known  of  it.  But  all 
the  details  of  the  narrative,  all  the  circumstances  associ- 
ated with  the  event— the  sadness  and  grief  of  the  father, 
the  pause  before  the  execution  of  the  vow,  the  annual 
ceremony  of  a  four  days'  lament  for  Jephthah's  daughter — 
show  that  the  thing  was  regarded  as  quite  unusual,  and 
had  stamped  itself  in  the  national  mind  as  an  occurrence 
rare  in  history.  Possibly,  nay  probably,  a  certain  glory 
encircled  the  name  of  Jephthah's  daughter  for  her  extra- 
ordinary devotion,  but  this  was  just  because  the  devotion 
was  extraordinary,  not  because  it  was  an  instance  of  a 
common  usage.  It  is  idle  in  such  a  connection  to  talk  of 
this  as  a  proof  that  the  Mosaic  law  forbidding  human 
sacrifice  was  not  known  to  Jephthah.  Such  a  law,  or  a 
hundred  similar,  may  have  existed  and  not  been  known 
to  this  Gileadite   chieftain ;    but  even   if   the   law   was 

1  Daumer,  p.  40  £F. 


256  Moloch -Worship,  etc, 

known,  he  was  not  in  a  mood  to  regulate  his  actions  by 
such  considerations.  The  man  was  burning  with  passion 
for  revenge,  and  to  nerve  himself  to  his  utmost  effort,  he 
bound  himself  by  the  most  solemn  vow  he  could  think 
of.  Thenceforth,  when  the  victory  was  secured,  there 
was  no  question,  to  a  superstitious  man,  of  Mosaic  laws — 
nay,  he  repressed  his  strongest  human  instincts ;  but  the 
act  was  not,  as  our  critics  would  make  us  believe,  the 
])erformance  of  an  ordinary  rite  to  a  bloodthirsty  God. 
Jephthah's  god  for  the  time  was  his  own  feeling  of  re- 
venge and  injured  pride,  and  his  law  was  the  honour  and 
sacredness  of  the  vow. 

We  have  still  to  refer  to  another  passage.  It  is  re- 
lated ^  that  the  King  of  Moab,  sore  pressed  by  the  allied 
armies  of  Israel  and  Judah  and  Edom,  and  having  failed  in 
an  attempt  "  to  break  through  unto  the  King  of  Edom," 
"  took  his  eldest  son  that  should  have  reigned  in  his  stead, 
and  offered  him  for  a  burnt-offering  upon  the  wall.  And 
there  was  great  indignation  against  Israel,  and  they  de- 
parted from  him  and  returned  to  their  own  land."  The 
I)assage  has  been  variously  explained,  and  in  different 
ways  an  argument  has  been  drawn  from  it  to  prove  that 
Moloch  and  Jehovah  were  identical,  or  that  the  tone  of 
Israel's  belief  in  their  God  was  as  low  as  that  of  the 
Moabites.  Daumer,  e.g.,  who  takes  the  lowest  possible 
view,  says,  "  This  offering,  according  to  the  Biblical  repre- 
sentation of  it,  worked  so  effectually  that  the  besiegers 
had  to  withdraw."  And  as  the  word  translated  "  indigna- 
tion "  is  the  word  used  of  the  divine  wrath,  he  goes  on  to 

^  2  Kings  iii.  26, 27.  This  passage  is  also  referred  to  in  another  connec- 
tion as  a  proof  that  the  power  of  Jahaveh  was  confined  to  his  own  land, 
and  that  beyond  its  boundaries  the  gods  of  the  respective  nations  were 
more  powerful. — Stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  430. 


The  King  of  Moab  and  his  Son,  257 

say,  "  There  came  a  great  wrath  of  Jehovah  upon  Israel 
and  drove  them  away,  so  that  the  God  to  whom  the 
Moabite  prince  presented  this  horrible  offering,  evidently 
coincides  with  the  Biblical  Jehovah,  and  the  power  and 
effectiveness  which  such  sacrifices  had  with  Jehovah  lie 
before  our  eyes  as  recognised  by  the  Bible  itself."  ^  Others 
explain  the  passage  to  mean  that  the  wrath  of  the  Moabite 
god,  called  forth  by  this  costly  appeal  to  him,  was  aroused, 
and  proved  so  effective  that  Israel  had  the  worst  of  the 
battle ;  and  that  under  the  obscure  phraseology  the  Hebrew 
writer  indicated,  what  he  would  not  say  outright,  that 
Jahaveh  was  not  a  match,  on  this  occasion,  for  the  Mo- 
abite god  on  Moabite  territory.  I  confess  I  do  not  know 
what  precisely  the  passage  means  ;  ^  the  multiplicity  of  in- 
terpretations given  of  it  is  a  proof  how^  obscure  it  is.  But 
to  attempt  to  explain  it  with  this  perpetual  insinuation 
that  the  Biblical  writers  have  something  to  conceal,  is  to 
come  to  it  with  a  prepossession,  and  seems  to  me  to  be 
fatal  to  any  satisfactory  exegesis.  The  writer,  if  he  was 
so  afraid  of  compromising  the  dignity  of  the  national  god, 
could  have  omitted  the  reference  altogether,  or  safeguarded 
the  national  faith  in  a  less  ambiguous  manner.  This  is 
not  an  instance  of  a  writer  finding  a  very  ancient  docu- 
ment, and  having  to  gloss  it  over  to  conceal  its  original 
meaning.  The  time  referred  to  is  in  the  historical  period ; 
and  the  writer  was  under  the  influence  of  prophetic  ideas, 
and  was  not  likely  to  express,  in  this  hesitating  and  doubt- 
ful way,  the  convictions  of  his  time  as  to  the  relative  power 
of  Jahaveh  and  heathen  gods. 

(5.)  As  little  convincing  is  the  argument  drawn  from 

*  Feuer  unci  Molochdienst,  p.  46. 

*  It  is  supposed  by  many  that  there  may  be  an  obscure  reference  to 
tliis  occurrence,  whatever  it  was,  in  Amos  ii.  1. 


258  Moloch-Worship,  etc. 

statements  of  the  prophets.  One  passage,  indeed,  is  so 
convincing  to  Daumer,^  that  he  says  it  "  shatters  all  our 
traditional  theology  with  one  blow."  It  is  the  passage  in 
Amos  (v.  25  f.)  which  Daumer  interprets  to  mean  that 
"  Israel,  during  all  the  forty  years  long  in  the  wilderness, 
did  not  serve  Jehovah,  but  Saturn-Kijjun,  as  their  king 
(Melech,  Molech,  Moloch)."  Such  a  distinct  declaration, 
he  says,^  should  be  seriously  faced,  and  he  complains  that 
only  in  liis  own  time  (1842)  had  writers  begun  to  give 
their  due  weight  to  such  prophetic  utterances,  and  in  this 
way  to  lay  the  foundations  of  an  entirely  new  history 
of  the  Old  Testament.  In  point  of  fact,  from  Vatke^ 
onwards,  critical  scholars  have  relied  very  strongly  on 
this  passage  in  support  of  their  views.  Kuenen  may  be 
taken  as  a  moderate  exponent  of  the  argument.  He  says,** 
"  The  prophet  Amos  states  that  the  Israelites  carried  about 
in  the  desert  *  the  tabernacle  [or  some  other  object :  the 
reading  is  uncertain]  of  their  king,'  or  '  Melech,*  and  other 
idolatrous  apparatus  besides.  This  statement  may  be  re- 
garded as  historical.  At  their  entrance  into  Canaan  the 
Israelites  found  there  the  worship  of  a  deity  to  whom 
children  were  sacrificed  (Deut.  xii.  30,  31  ;  2  Kings  xvi. 
3.  Comp.  Levit.  xviii.  21 ;  xx.  2-5),  probably  likewise 
called  Melech.  It  may  be  assumed  that  the  Israelitish 
Melech-worship  became  fused  with  the  Canaanitish,  and 
that  thus  from  the  time  of  their  entrance  into  Canaan  tliis 
worship  existed,  and  the  sacrifice  of  children  to  Melech 
occurred  sporadically.  The  worship  of  Melech,  however, 
was  of  no  great  importance."  With  this  last  statement 
Daum.er  would  not  agree;  but,  letting  that  pass,  it  is 
worth   while    drawing   attention   to   the   readiness    with 

r :  1-  Feuer  mid  Molochdienst.  p.  47  ff.  ^  Ibid.,  p.  49, 

»  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  191.  ■*  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol,  i.  p.  250.   • 


Amos  on  the  Wilderness  Period.  259 

\vliich  all  this  school  accepts  as  "  historical "  a  statement 
of  the  prophet  Amos  in  regard  to  a  time  of  which,  in  other 
connections,  they  are  fond  of  telling  us,  he  could  have  had 
no  knowledge  whatever ;  and  it  is  somewhat  peculiar  to 
find  writers  who  tell  us  that  there  was  no  forty  years' 
wandering  in  the  desert  at  all,  accepting  the  testimony  of 
Amos  in  regard  to  the  religious  practices  of  a  time  which 
he  so  precisely  defines.  Again,  a  favourite  proceeding 
with  the  modern  school,  when  a  passage  is  inconvenient 
for  their  theory,  is  to  say  that  it  has  been  touched  by 
later  hands,  or  that  it  disturbs  the  connection,  and  there- 
fore is  to  be  rejected  as  an  interpolation.  The  English 
reader  may  look  at  the  passage  before  us  in  its  connection 
and  see  whether  it  is  not  particularly  one  of  that  descrip- 
tion. Yet  we  never  hear  from  the  critics  a  word  against 
its  genuineness.  I  do  not  mean  to  cast  suspicion  on  it  on 
that  account,  or  to  dispute  Kuenen's  assertion  that  the 
statement  of  the  prophet  "  may  be  regarded  as  historical." 
My  difficulty  is  that,  as  the  various  interpretations  of  the 
passage  will  show,  one  can  scarcely  make  out  what  the 
statement  precisely  is.^  And  whatever  it  may  be,  the 
question  arises.  If  this  Moloch -worship  was  the  recog- 
nised national  worship  of  Israel  in  the  desert,  why  should 
Amos  make  that  a  matter  of  reproach,  as  he  seems  to  do  ? 
To  which  the  only  reply  can  be  the  usual  one.  The  pro- 
phet, from  his  prophetical  standpoint,  projected  his  own 
ideas  into  the  past,  and  gives  us  an  unhistorical  view  of 
the  religion, — the  same  prophet  who  in  the  same  breath 
is  taken  as  a  proof  of  a  historical  statement  to  the  very 
opposite  effect.  I  do  not  suppose  modern  criticism  can 
go  much  further.  If  it  be  urged  that  Amos  merely  states 
that  this  Moloch-worship  was  practised  in  the  desert,  then 

1  See  Note  XIX. 


360  Moloch -Worship,  etc. 

who  is  to  deny  that?  Tlie  Biblical  historians  represent 
the  religious  life  of  Israel  at  that  time  as  far  from  correct ; 
and  it  is  they  who  tell  us  plainly  of  the  practice  of  Moloch- 
worship  in  the  time  of  the  Kings.  But  it  is  a  fiction  of 
modern  writers  that  this  worship  was  ever  regarded  by 
prophetic  men,  or  by  the  best  of  the  nation,  as  the  national 
worship  of  Israel. 

There  is  still  the  famous  passage  in  Micah  vi.  6,  7: 
"  Wherewithal  shall  I  come  before  Jahaveh  ?  .  .  .  Shall  I 
give  my  first-born  for  my  transgression,  the  fruit  of  my 
body  for  the  sin  of  my  soul?"  in  which,  says  Kuenen, 
"  it  is  undoubtedly  implied  that  in  his  days  such  a  sacri- 
fice was  not  looked  upon  as  at  all  unreasonable ;  ...  if 
human  sacrifice  had  been  foreign  to  the  service  of  Israel's 
God,  he  could  not  have  mentioned  it  in  this  manner."^ 
Daumer  goes  further :  "  In  these  words  is  expressed  witli- 
out  doubt  the  prevailing  belief  to  be  that  Jehovah  has 
pleasure  not  only  in  animal  sacrifices  but  also  in  human 
offerings,  and  that  in  the  offering  of  a  first-born  son  there 
was  the  efficacy  of  wiping  out  sin.  .  .  .  Israel  worships 
its  Jehovah  with  burnt-offerings,  calves  of  a  year  old, 
rams,  oil,  and  the  offering  of  first-born  sons,  and  believes 
that  this  is  necessary  for  salvation  and  in  accordance  with 
Jehovah's  will  and  law;"^  and  in  a  footnote  he  blames 
Gramberg  for  still  adhering  to  the  old  belief  that  the 
custom  of  offering  children  liad  passed  over  from  the 
Moloch-worship  to  that  of  Jehovah.  It  is  difficult  to 
place  one's  self  in  the  mental  attitude  of  one  who  can 
reason  in  this  way,  or  to  understand  how  to  such  a  one 
the  rhetoric  of  a  Hebrew  writer  can  have  any  force.  The 
prophet  propounds  a  most  solemn  question — How  is  man 

^  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  237. 
2  Feuer  und  Molochdienst,  p.  52. 


The  Passage  in  Micah.  261 

to  find  acceptance  with  God? — and  his  answer^  takes  the 
form  of  a  climax  in  which  he  rises  from  the  idea  of  a 
costly  to  that  of  a  still  costlier  offering,  and,  as  Kuenen 
rightly  observes,  he  knows  tliat  there  is  a  better  way  tlian 
by  any  such  sacrifice.  To  Daumer  it  may  be  replied,  if 
the  offering  of  children  was  as  common  as  the  offering  of 
rams  and  oil,  why  does  the  prophet  make  all  this  ado 
about  it  ?  The  prophet  has  no  idea  of  ordinary  offerings 
in  his  mind.  Does  Daumer  mean  to  tell  us  that  it  was 
the  common  thing  for  an  individual  offerer,  in  order  to 
atone  for  sin,  to  offer  thousands  of  rams,  and  ten  thousand 
rivers  of  oil?  It  is  on  these  points  that  the  emphasis 
lies ;  and  it  is  these  that  give  force  to  the  grand  climax, 
shall  I  give  my  first-horn  for  my  transgression  ?  The 
prophet  supposes  the  very  highest  form  conceivable  of 
sacrifice,  and  declares  that  it  is  all  in  vain.  And  the 
proper  conclusion  to  be  drawn  from  his  word  is,  that  no 
sacrifice  in  itself  is  pleasing  to  Jahaveh,  not  even  the 
most  costly  that  could  be  conceived.  But  it  is  asked, 
Why  does  lie  instance  this  kind  of  offering  if  he  did  not 
know  of  it  ?  The  answer  is,  He  did  know  of  it,  but  he 
did  not  know  of  it  as  a  tiling  done  to  Jahaveh,  any  more 
than  he  knew  of  ten  thousands  of  rivers  of  oil  being 
offered.  Is  there  no  such  thing  as  rhetoric  for  our  critics  ? 
When  St  Paul,  in  one  of  his  most  eloquent  flights,  says, 
"  Though  I  give  all  my  goods  to  feed  the  poor,  and  though 
I  give  my  body  to  be  burned,  and  have  not  charity,  I  am 
nothing,"  are  we  to  conclude  that  the  early  Christians  of 
his  day,  having  as  at  Pentecost  given  all  their  goods  to 
a  common  fund,  were  also  in  the  habit  of  worshipping 

^  It  may  be  pointed  out  that  the  passage,  standing  in  connection  with 
V.  5,  may  be  taken  as  expressing,  dramatically,  a  question  put  by  Balak 
(vv.  6,  7),  with  Balaam's  answer  (v.  8). 


Of  THS 

[TJ'5IVBI 


262  Moloch  -  Worship,  etc. 

this  same  fiery  Moloch  ?  One  would  say  there  was  less 
reason  for  St  Paul  making  such  a  rhetorical  supposi- 
tion of  self-immolation  in  his  day  than  for  Micah,  with 
Moloch-worshippers  around  him,  making  it  in  his.  But 
in  neither  case  is  the  custom  proved,  and  tliere  is  ab- 
solutely nothing  more  in  the  critical  argument  from  the 
words  of  Micah  than  an  aggravating  attempt  to  spoil 
one  of  the  finest  passages  of  sacred  oratory. 

It  is  unnecessary  to  enter  into  lengthened  examination 
of  other  passages  relied  upon  in  tliis  connection,  such  as 
David's  slaughter  of  Saul's  descendants  to  appease  the 
Gibeonites  (2  Sam.  xxi.  1-14),  and  Samuel's  hewing  Agag 
in  pieces  before  the  Lord  in  Gilgal  (1  Sam.  xv.  33).  The 
general  remark  may  be  made,  that  by  themselves  they  are 
not  even  so  plausible  as  the  cases  already  stated,  and  like 
these  do  not  really  touch  the  point  in  dispute.^  Kuenen, 
feeling  that  such  passages  as  have  been  considered  do  not 
yield  a  decisive  result  for  his  view,  makes  the  remark :  ^ 
"  A  solitary  instance  of  this  nature  would  perhaps  be 
susceptible  of  another  interpretation  ;  in  their  interdepen- 
dence these  various  facts  undoubtedly  bear  witness  to  the 
accuracy  of  the  conclusion  advanced  above;"  and  it  is  a 
favourite  method  with  writers  of  his  school  to  speak  &f 
the  argument  as  cumuLative.  It  is  a  very  specious  plea, 
and  I  believe  more  are  led  by  it  to  give  their  adherence 
to  the  modern  theory  than  by  any  one  positive  and  con- 
clusive proof.  Seeing  that  so  many  passages  and  references 
can  be  made  to  lend  countenance  to  the  theory,  they  come 
to  the  conclusion  that  "  there  must  be  something  in  it," 
and  are  vaguely  convinced  or  half  persuaded.  Yet  we 
are  familiar  with  the  similar  marshalling  of  evidence  in 
favour  of  all  kinds  of  extravagant  theories.  The  in- 
1  See  Note  XX.  2  j^gUg.  of  jgrael,  vol.  i.  p.  237. 


Cwnulative  Argument,  263 

dividual  proofs  have  no  force  till  the  theory  to  be 
proved  is  thrown  into  the  balance,  although  an  op- 
posing theory  would  equally  well  act  as  counterpoise,  or 
even  suit  better.  Before  there  can  be  cumulative  evi- 
dence, there  must  rest  in  each  individual  case  a  pre- 
sumption, and  two  cases  must  not  mutually  supplement 
one  another,  else  it  is  a  cumulus  of  unsupported  suspi- 
cions. We  know  how  in  social  life  the  iteration  of  a 
calumny  is  supported  by  innumerable  little  incidents,  not 
one  of  which  in  itself  has  any  positive  value,  but  all, 
strung  together  on  the  string  of  whispered  slander,  suffice 
.by  their  cumulative  evidence  to  ruin  a  character.  It  is 
necessary  to  protest  against  such  a  mode  of  reasoning, 
because  it  is  apt  to  sap  the  very  foundations  of  exegesis  on 
which  alone  any  positive  result  must  rest.  When  Daumer, 
for  example,  in  his  effort  to  establish  his  thesis,  draws 
proofs  from  the  practices  of  nations  at  the  most  remote 
distances  from  one  another,  and  in  the  most  diverse  stages 
of  culture,  and  forces  the  most  natural  usages  of  language 
into  evidences  for  his  view,  one  is  led  to  despair  of  the 
possibility  of  getting  any  reliable  conclusion  at  all  from 
the  Biblical  writings.  For  him  it  is  sufficient  that  there 
is  a  river  in  Macedon  and  a  river  in  Monmouth,  and  that 
there  is  salmon  in  both.  But  his  mode  of  procedure 
brings  Biblical  exegesis  into  contempt;  and  it  is  a  pity 
that  more  modern  writers  have  not  been  warned  by  his 
example  not  to  enter  upon  a  line  of  reasoning  which 
manifestly  ends  in  absurdity.  Surely  in  the  examin- 
ation of  a  problem  so  very  delicate  and  so  very  vital, 
it  is  becoming  to  proceed  with  the  utmost  caution.  If  a 
passage  called  as  evidence  is  seen  to  have  no  direct  force, 
when  calmly  interpreted  in  the  light  of  the  context,  the 
witness  should  simply  be  made  to  stand  down,  and  not  be 


264  Moloch  -  Worship,  etc, 

again  appealed  to.  It  should  not  be  beneath  the  dignity 
of  a  critic  to  say  frankly  that  a  passage,  whether  from  the 
condition  of  the  text  or  from  our  ignorance  of  its  reference, 
is  neutral  or  unintelligible,  so  that  attention  may  be  con- 
centrated on  less  ambiguous  proofs. 

After  all  their  bold  pretensions,  therefore,  to  prove  that 
the  pre-prophetic  religion  of  Israel  was  of  the  low  char- 
acter affirmed  of  it,  the  critics,  it  seems  to  me,  succeed  in 
proving  very  little.  They  have  done  valuable  service  in 
drawing  attention  to  popular  conceptions  or  misconcep- 
tions; and  had  their  labours  been  confined  to  this  as  a 
contribution  to  our  knowledge  of  the  working  of  the  reli- 
gious instinct  at  all  times,  they  would  have  been  excellent. 
This  indiscriminate  mixing  up  of  early  and  late,  however, 
which  is  seen  in  the  reasoning  from  metaphorical  language 
and  so-called  mythological  expressions,  defeats  the  very 
end  of  the  argument,  which  is  to  show  development.  And 
there  is  ever  the  objection  to  the  whole  argument,  that  it 
assumes  a  tone  of  prevailing  thought  on  religious  matters 
at  the  very  time  of  the  first  writing  prophets,  which  is 
inconsistent  with  the  tone  in  which  these  men  write, 
and  directly  in  the  teeth  of  the  declarations  which  they 
make  on  the  whole  subject. 

-  Finally,  however,  the  modern  historians  should  beware 
of  attempting  to  prove  too  much  in  this  direction ;  for  the 
more  the  pre-prophetic  religion  is  depreciated,  the  more 
difficult  it  will  be  to  account  for  its  sudden  rise  to  the 
level  in  which  we  find  it  in  the  earliest  writing  prophets. 
There  is  not  only  the  task  of  accounting  for  the  continu- 
ance of  Israel  as  a  separate  people,  with  distinctive  beliefs 
and  practices,  during  the  long  period  that  this  low  stage 
lasted,  but  there  is  the  greater  difficulty  of  showing  how, 
from  the  low  level  which  is  assumed,  it  was  possible  for 


Proving  too  much.  265 

the  religion  by  ordinary  development  to  rise  to  the  ethic 
monotheism  in  which  it  so  soon  appears.  Granted  even 
that  the  case  for  the  modern  theory  has  been  so  far  made 
out,  what  was  there  at  all  in  the  religion  of  Jahaveh  to 
make  it  a  distinctive  religion  of  Israel,  and  to  give  to 
that  people  the  only  bond  that  could  unite  them  to  one 
another,  and  mark  them  off  from  their  neighbours  ?  Or 
if  that  is  not  enough,  what  was  there  to  enable  them  to 
rise,  as  they  did  rise,  from  this  low  level  to  the  height  of 
the  so-called  ethic  monotheism  ?  And  how  was  it  that, 
with  the  first  appearance  of  written  prophecy,  we  find  the 
teaching  of  a  much  purer  faith,  appealing  also  to  a  hoary 
antiquity  for  its  sanction  ? 

We  must  therefore  now  inquire  particularly  what  was 
this  Jahaveh  religion,  and  how  its  subsistence  for  so  long 
and  its  rise  to  its  purest  form  are  accounted  for. 


266 


CHAPTER    XL 


THE    JAHAVEH    RELIGION. 

The  Jahaveh  religion  characteristic  of  Israel — The  points  to  he  examined  in 
this  chapter :  I.  Its  origin ;  II.  Its  specific  initial  significance — /. 
Origin  sought  for  in  (1)  Indo -Ger manic  ;  (2)  Assyro-Babylonian  ;  (3) 
Egyptian;  (i)  Kenite ;  and  (5)  Canaanite  language  or  religion — Con- 
clusion that  it  is  distinctively  Israelite — //,  Significance — Etymological 
considerations — Critical  derivation,  "  thunderer" — Biblical  derivation 
— Historical  considerations  in  its  favour — Importance  of  determining 
the  initial  signification  of  the  name — //  it  is  of  Israelite  origin,  and 
introduced  under  definite  historical  circumstances,  it  must  have  a 
specific  signification — The  other  explanation  is  open  to  the  following 
objections:  (1)  There  is  no  evidence  that  Jahaveh  was  a  tribal  God; 
(2)  No  reason  is  given  for  the  substitution  of  the  name  Jahaveh  for 
El ;  (3)  Stadc's  proofs  are  a  confusion  of  early  and  late,  and  give  no 
intelligible  account  of  the  initial  significance  of  the  pre-prophetic  con- 
ception of  Jahaveh — Conclusion  that  higher  qualities  were  there  from 
the  first. 

The  thing  that  distinguished  Israel  in  early  times  from 
the  surrounding  nations,  and  in  later  times,  was  their  con- 
tribution to  the  religious  good  of  the  world,  was  the  pos- 
session of  the  Jahaveh  religion.  Even  if  we  admit  that, 
as  is  maintained,  Jahaveh  was  only  to  them  what  the  gods 
of  the  nations  around  them  were  to  their  worshippers,  they 
had  this,  at  least,  as  a  distinctive  mark ;  and  it  was  from 
it  as  a  germ  that  the  purer  religion  of  the  propliets  was 


Points  to  he  determined.  267 

developed.  Even  if,  in  pre-prophetic  times,  the  national 
religion  v^as  of  a  low  type,  at  the  bottom  of  it  lay  tlie 
belief  that  Jahaveh  was  Israel's  God ;  nay,  even  if  they 
thought  it  no  sin  to  employ  the  names  of  heathen  deities 
in  forming  proper  names  and  so  forth,  they  were  all  the 
time  professors  of  the  Jaliaveh  religion,  and  the  most  that 
can  be  said  is,  that  they  bestowed  on  Jahaveh  Himself 
those  names  that  other  nations  applied  to  their  gods.  I 
have  advanced  considerations  to  show  that  the  positions 
referred  to  as  to  the  low  character  of  the  pre-prophetic  reli- 
gion are  not  by  any  means  established.  But  I  insist  upon 
this  point  now,  that  even  if  they  were  established,  the 
great  problem  has  still  to  be  solved.  Two  points,  mentioned 
in  a  former  chapter ,i  still  remain  to  be  demonstrated: 
(1)  We  must  be  shown  the  origin  of  the  Jahaveh  religion, 
and  it  must  be  seen  to  have  such  distinctive  marks  as  will 
make  it  characteristic  of  Israel,  and  bind  them  together  at 
the  most  critical  period  of  their  history ;  and  then  (2)  the 
process  of  development  must  be  pointed  out  by  which,  in 
well-marked  historical  stadia,  it  rose  to  the  religion  which 
is  described  as  ethic  monotheism.  Briefly  put,  we  must 
have  an  explanation  of  the  Jaliaveh  religion  at  both  ex- 
tremities of  its  development,  at  its  start  and  at  its  final 
development ;  and  it  is  incumbent  on  those  who  refuse 
to  take  the  Biblical  account  of  the  matter  to  present 
lis  with  another  that  will  stand  the  test  of  historical 
criticism.  They  must  show  us  {a)  the  source  of  the 
Jahaveh  religion ;  (b)  its  specific  initial  significance ;  and 
(c)  its  historical  development  from  the  lower  to  the  higher 
stage.  A  consideration  of  the  first  two  of  these  three 
points  will  be  the  subject  of  this  chapter. 

I.  In  regard  to  the  origin  of  the  Jahaveh  religion,  as  in 

1  Chapter  vi,  p.  166. 


268  The  Jahaveh  Religion, 

regard  to  other  distinctive  features  of  the  history,  investi- 
gations have  been  pursued  in  various  directions  with  the 
view  of  discovering,  if  possible,  some  point  of  contact  with 
and  dependence  upon  other  nations  with  which  Israel  was 
brought  into  connection ;  and  different  investigators  have 
thought  that  they  have  discovered  either  the  actual  name 
Jahaveh,  or  the  idea  which  it  expresses,  in  the  languages 
and  religious  conceptions  of  different  peoples.  Inquiries 
of  this  kind  are  perfectly  legitimate,  and  often  lead  to 
most  instructive  results.  The  issue  of  them,  however, 
must  be  carefully  noted.  When,  for  example,  Wellhausen 
says  that  Nabiism  passed  over  from  the  Phoenicians  to 
Israel  at  a  certain  time,  that  is  not  a  final  explanation  of 
Israelite  prophetism.  Even  if  the  fact  were  as  he  asserts 
— and  it  depends  very  much  on  his  assertion — there  still 
remains  to  be  explained  how  the  "passing  over"  took 
place  at  such  a  time,  and  the  more  difficult  fact  that  it 
passed  over  into  so  different  a  phenomenon ;  and  for 
both  these  circumstances  we  have  to  fall  ba'ck  upon 
some  predisposing  cause,  and  some  inherent  capability 
in  Israel.  Similarly,  should  it  be  proved  that  the  name 
Jahaveh,  or  the  idea  denoted  by  the  name,  is  found 
among  some  other  people,  we  are  no  nearer  the  solution 
of  the  problem.  First  of  all,  we  are  driven  a  step  farther 
back  in  our  search  for  its  origin,  and  have  to  explain 
whence  that  other  people  got  it ;  and  secondly,  we  have 
to  account  for  Israel's  adopting  it ;  and  lastly,  we  have 
to  explain  why  it  became,  in  their  hands,  quite  a  new 
thing. 

The  investigations  that  have  been  made  in  the  direc- 
tions indicated  are  interesting  and  exhaustive.  The 
name,  or  the  idea  which  it  expresses,  has  been  in  turn 
sought  for  in  (1)  Indo-Germanic  ;  (2)  in  Assyro-Babylon- 
ian ;  (3)  Egyptian ;    (4)  Kenite ;   and  (5)  Canaanite  Ian- 


Indo-Gerinanw  Derivation.  2G9 

guage  or  religion.    We  must  briefly  consider  the  arguments 
advanced  for  these  various  views. 

(1.)  An  Indo- Germanic  source  of  the  name  has  been 
sought  by  some  scholars.  Thus  Yon  Bohlen,^  referring 
to  the  varying  forms,  Jave,  Jaho,  and  Jao  (law),  under 
which  the  name  appears  in  writings  of  the  Jews,  Samari- 
tans, and  Christian  fathers,  says  that  "  in  this  shape  it  is 
clearly  connected  with  the  names  of  the  Deity  in  many 
other  languages  " — Greek,  Latin,  and  Sanscrit — and  that 
the  original  form  would  liave  been  Jah.  This  opinion 
has  been  pronounced  by  J.  G.  Miiller^  as  "not  lightly 
to  be  set  aside."  The  idea  is  that  the  Tndo-Germanic 
root  div  =  shine,  which  lies  at  the  basis  of  Jovis  or 
Diovis,  is  to  be  recognised  as  also  underlying  the  Hebrew 
tetragrammaton,  which  originally  may  have  sounded  Javo, 
Jevo,  Jove,  or  Jeva.  But  the  connection  of  the  Indo- 
Germanic  root  with  the  Hebrew  vocable  cannot  be  made 
out  so  easily  as  is  thus  done.  And  there  are  two  special 
difficulties  in  the  way  of  such  a  theory, — {a)  that  if 
Jahaveh  is  originally  an  Indo  -  Germanic  word  corre- 
sponding to  a  root  div,  which  is  widely  diffused  in  these 
languages,  it  does  not  appear  to  have  passed  over  in  this 
sense  into  the  Semitic  languages  generally,  but  only  to 
have  been  appropriated  for  a  special  name  by  a  small 
and  comparatively  insignificant  branch  of  them ;  and  {h) 
more  particularly,  there  is  already  in  the  Hebrew  lan- 
guage, not  to  speak  of  other  branches  of  Semitic,  a 
common  root,  hawa,  from  which  the  name  can  be  de- 
rived by  an  exact  analogy  with  other  proper  names,  like 
Isaac,  Jacob,  and  so  forth. 

*  Introduction  to  the  Book  of  Genesis,  Hcyvvood's  Tianslation  (1855), 
vol.  i.  p.  151  f.     Compare  Vatke,  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  672. 

*  Die  Semiten  in  ihrera  Verhiiltniss  zu  Cbamiten  u.  Japhethiten  (1872), 
p.  163  f. 


270  The  Jahavclh  Religion. 

Hitzig^  sought  in  another  way  to  derive  the  name,  or 
rather  the  idea,  from  an  Aryan  source.  The  Armenian 
name  of  God  is  Astuads  (Astovads)  —  i.e.,  astvat,  "the 
becoming  one  " ;  and  Hitzig  supposed  that  Moses  —  to 
whom  he  ascribes  the  introduction  of  Jahaveh  as  a 
divine  name — reflecting  on  the  truth  and  depth  of  the 
thought  contained  in  this  designation  of  the  Deity,  adopted 
it  in  a  translated  form  as  the  name  of  the  God  whose  re- 
ligion he  taught.  What  gives  a  colour  of  support  to  this 
explanation  is,  that  some  of  the  earliest  traditions  of  the 
Hebrews  seem  to  come  from  or  to  be  connected  with 
Armenia  and  the  north-east  generally.^  There  remains 
the  difficulty,  however,  of  explaining  how  Moses,  in  the 
land  of  Egypt,  should  have  had  a  knowledge  of  the 
Armenian  language,  and  should  have  turned  to  that 
quarter  for  an  idea  to  denote  his  God.  If  tliere  is  any 
truth  in  the  theory  at  all,  it  would  rather  lead  to  a  pre- 
Mosaic  origin  of  the  idea.  And  if  the  early  Armenians 
expressed  tlie  idea  they  attached  to  God  by  a  word  de- 
noting Being  or  Becoming,  it  is  possible  to  conceive  that 
the  family  of  Abraham,  travelling  from  Babylon  by  that 
way.  may  have  reached  the  same  notion ;  and  that  thus 
the  idea,  kept  as  a  primitive  tradition  down  to  the  time 
of  Moses,  found  expression  in  the  tetragrammaton  which 
was  its  translation. 

(2.)  Turning  now  to  another  quarter,  Friedrich  Delitzsch^ 
has  lately  maintained  that  tlie  name  Jehovah  is  of  Assyro- 

J  Bil.l.  Theol.  d.  Alteu  Test.,  p.  a7  f. 

-  Dillmann,  in  a  paper,  "  Ueber  die  Herkunft  der  urgeschichtlichen 
Sagen  der  Hebraer"  (Sitzungsbericlite  der  Akad.  d.  Wissenschaften  zu 
Berlin,  27  April  1882),  contends  that  many  of  these  traditions  not  only 
have  their  counterparts  in  Babylonian  beliefs,  but  are  the  common  pro- 
perty of  other  Eastern  peoples. 

3  Wo  lag  das  Paradies  ?  (1881),  p.  158  flf. 


Assyro-Babylonian  Derivation.  271 

Babylonian  origin.  The  divine  name  Jau,  he  says,  the 
Hebrews  had  in  common  with  at  least  the  Philistines, 
and  probably  with  the  Canaanites  generally ;  and  it  was 
in  fact  to  distinguish  their  own  God  from  the  Jau  of  the 
other  peoples  that  the  name  was  modified  to  the  Hebrew 
form,  in  the  sense  of  the  "  becoming  one."  But,  he  pro- 
ceeds, this  Canaanite  name  Jah  (like  most  other  Canaanite 
divine  names)  has  its  root  in  the  Babylonian  pantheon, 
answering  to  Ja-u  (corresponding  to  Ilu),  the  supreme  God 
of  the  oldest  Babylonian  system.  The  name,  however, 
is  the  creation  of  the  non-Semitic  people  of  Babylon, 
though  it  came  to  the  Canaanites  through  the  Semitic 
Babylonians.  The  original  Accadian  form  of  the  name 
was  i,  which  the  Semitic  Babylonians  transformed  into 
Jau,  in  which  form  it  reached  the  Canaanites ;  so  that, 
instead  of  forms  like  Jah,  Jahu,  being  abbreviations  of 
the  longer  Jahaveh,  the  longer  form  was  produced  by 
successive  modification  from  the  primary  monosyllabic  i. 
As  to  this  opinion,  it  is  just  as  conceivable,  to  say  the 
least,  that  the  full  name  Jahaveh  became  contracted  into 
Jahu,  Jau,  Jo,  or  Jah,  as  that  the  converse  process  took 
place.  We  have  a  parallel  example  to  illustrate  the  con- 
tracting process,^  but  the  lengthening  process,"  especially 
as  described  by  Delitzsch,  seems  highly  artificial ;  and, 
in  point  of  fact,  another  competent  authority,^  in  ex- 
amining the  question  whether  the  name  Jahaveh  can 
be  traced  to  Accadian  -  Sumerian  origin,  denies  that 
deities  of  the  names  Jau  and  i  were  ever  recognised  at 
all  in  those  regions. 

^  As  has  been  pointed  out,  there  is  a  complete  analogy  in  the  form 
yishtahaveh  ('n'lnTlK''''")?  regularly  contracted  into  yishtahu  ('^riDSJ*''') 

2  Friedrich  Philippi  in  Ztschr.  fiir  Volkerpsychologie  u.  Sprachwissen- 
Bchaft  (1883),  pp.  175-190. 


272  The  Jaliaveli  Eeligion. 

In  another  way  it  has  been  attempted  to  prove  that 
this  name  came  from  the  same  quarter.  It  is  supposed 
that  Canaanite  immigrants  who  wandered  out  from  the 
region  of  the  Erythraean  Sea  ^  and  came  in  contact  with 
Semitic  peoples,  brought  this  name  with  them,  and  that  it 
was  adopted  into  Semitic.  In  support  of  this  view  it  is 
pointed  out  that  Toi,  king  of  Hamath,  in  David's  time 
sent  his  son,  named  Joram,  to  salute  David  (2  Sam.  viii. 
9),  and  that  the  name  of  this  son  contains  the  tetra- 
grammaton  in  an  abbreviated  form,  just  as  certain  names 
of  Hebrew  personages  do.  There  are  other  isolated  cases 
found  on  the  cuneiform  inscriptions ;  but  seeing  that 
they  occur  at  a  period  when  the  religion  of  Jahaveh  was 
long  the  acknowledged  religion  of  the  Hebrews,  it  is 
perhaps  safer  to  regard  these  as  isolated  instances  of  what 
was  not  uncommon — a  non- Semitic  people  adopting  the 
name  of  a  Semitic  god  into  the  circle  of  their  deities. 
This  is  the  view  taken  by  Baudissin,^  and  also  by 
Schrader,  whose  cautious  remarks,  in  favour  of  a  con- 
current derivation  of  the  name  Jahve  by  the  Hebrews 
and  Assyrians,  are  worth  referring  to.^ 

(3.)  Let  us  turn  now  to  Egypt  and  see  whether  any 
light  can  be  derived  from  that  quarter.  And  here  we 
have,  (a)  first  the  attempts  to  trace  the  name  itself,  as  by 
Eoth/  who  identifies  Jahaveh  with,  or  makes  it  a  modi- 
fication of,  the  Egyptian  Job,  the  moon-god.    He  does  not 

^  In  proof  of  such  wandering,  see  Konig's  Hist.  Krit.  Lelirgebaude  der 
Heb.  Sprache,  vol.  i.  (1881)  p.  14  f.  The  proof,  he  maintains,  is  not  in- 
validated by  Budde,  Die  Biblische  Urgeschichte  (1883),  p.  329  ff. 

-  Der  Ursprung  des  Gottes  namens  law,  in  his  Studien,  vol.  i.  p.  223. 

^  The  Cuneiform  Inscriptions  and  the  Old  Test.,  Eng.  transl.,  vol.  i. 
p.  23  ff. 

■*  Geschichte  unserer  Abendlandischen  Philosophic,  Erster  Band,  2te 
Auflage  (1862),  Note  175,  p.  143. 


Egyptian  Derivation,  273 

explain,  however,  how  it  was  that  the  name  of  a  god 
especially  associated  with  the  moon  should  have  been 
bestowed  on  a  deity  of  whose  connection  with  the  moon 
we  have  no  trace ;  and  it  is  very  probable  that  we  have 
here  nothing  more  than  a  fortuitous  coincidence  of  two 
names  which  never  had  any  connection  in  the  minds  of 
those  who  employed  them,  (b)  On  the  other  hand,  not 
a  few  have  thought  that  the  idea  expressed  by  the  name 
is  to  be  found  in  Egyptian  sources,  and  may  have  been 
borrowed  in  Hebrew  form  by  Israel  in  Egypt,  (a)  Plu- 
tarch mentions  an  inscription  on  the  temple  of  Isis  at 
Sais,  in  which  a  deity  is  described  in  terms  resembling 
the  "  I  am  that  I  am  "  denoted  by  Jahaveh  (Exod.  iii.  14) ; 
but  the  ideas  conveyed  by  the  two  do  not,  when  examined, 
correspond  in  the  way  that  it  is  alleged.^  (/3)  Others, 
again,  find  in  the  name  Jahaveh  a  Hebrew  reproduction 
(I  am  that  I  am)  of  the  Egyptian  mck  pic  mch^  But  on 
this  subject  we  should  hear  what  is  said  by  so  competent 
an  authority  as  Le  Page  Eenouf :  * 

"  It  is  quite  true  that  in  several  places  of  the  Book  of  the  Dead  the 
three  words  nuk  pu  nuk  are  to  be  found  ;  it  is  true  that  nuk  is  the  pro- 
noun I,  and  that  the  demonstrative  -pu  often  serves  to  connect  the  sub- 
ject and  predicate  of  a  sentence.  But  the  context  of  the  words  requires 
to  be  examined  before  we  can  be  sure  that  we  have  just  an  entire  sen- 
tence before  us,  especially  as  pu  generally  comes  at  the  end  of  a  sen- 
tence. Now  if  we  look  at  the  passages  of  the  Book  of  the  Dead  where 
these  words  occur,  we  shall  see  at  once  that  they  do  not  contain  any 
mysterious  doctrine  about  the  divine  nature.  In  one  of  these  pas- 
sages the  deceased  says,  '  It  is  I  who  know  the  ways  of  Nu.'    In 


^  Konig,  Hauptprobleme,  p.  31,  to  whom  I  am  indebted  for  much  of  the 
material  and  many  suggestions  in  this  chapter. 

'^  So  Wahrmund,  Babylonierthum,  Israelitenthum,  Christenthum,  p. 
219. 

3  Hibbert  Lecture  for  1879,  p.  244  f. 

S 


274  Hie  Jahaveh  Religion. 

another  place  he  says,  *I  am  the  ancient  one  in  the  country  [or 
fields]  ;  it  is  I  who  am  Osiris,  who  shut  up  his  father  Seb  and  his 
mother  Nut  on  that  day  of  the  great  slaughter.' '' 

These  attempts  to  derive  the  name  or  the  idea  from 
Egypt  are  therefore  very  precarious. 

(4.)  Once  more,  the  idea  has  been  put  forth  that  the 
national  God  of  Israel  was  first  of  all  the  tribal  God  of  the 
Kenites,  with  whom  Israel  came  in  contact  in  the  wilder- 
ness, and  to  whose  family  Moses  is  represented  as  being 
related  by  marriage  (Exod.  ii.  16 ;  Judges  i.  16,  iv.  11). 
This  supposition,  advanced  by  Ghillany,^  has  been  taken 
up  and  advocated  by  Tiele,^  and  also  by  Stade.^  The  only 
shadow  of  proof  I  can  find  for  this  view  as  put  forth 
by  Stade  is,  that  Moses  must  have  borrowed  the  name 
of  his  deity  from  some  one ;  and  as  Jethro  was  a  priest 
and  Moses  was  in  close  association  with  him,  the  name  was 
simply  carried  over,  and  thus  marks  tlie  continuation  of 
an  older  faith.  Of  actual  proof  that  this  was  so,  we  have 
none ;  and  even  if  we  had,  we  should  simply  have  to  go 
in  search  of  an  older  source.  No  proof  is  given  that 
Jahaveh  was  the  tribal  God  of  the  Kenites,  nor  is  any 
explanation  given  why  the  Hebrews,  if  they  had  no  tribal 
god  before,  should  have  adopted  this  deity,  or,  if  they  had, 
why  they  made  the  exchange  at  this  particular  time.  It 
may  be  urged,  moreover,  against  this  supposition,  that  the 

^  Theologische  Briefe  an  die  Gebildeten  der  deutschen  Nation  von 
nichard  von  der  Aim  (1862),  vol.  i.  pp.  216,  480.  Though  Ghillany 
writes  under  this  pseudonym,  tlie  tone  of  this  work,  like  that  which  finds 
expression  in  liis  *  Meuschenopfer  der  Hebriier,'  is  unmistakable.  The 
deity  of  the  Kenites,  he  says,  was  the  sun — worshipped,  however,  not  aa 
a  liviiig  bull  as  in  Egypt,  but  in  the  form  of  a  metallic  image. 

2  Vergelijkende  Geschied.  van  de  Egypt,  en  Mesopot.  Godsdieusten,  p, 
559  ;  Kompendium,  §  52. 

'  Geschichte  des  Volkes  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  130  f. 


Kenite  or  Canaanite  Derivation.  275 

Kenites,  though  both  in  the  wilderness  and  in  Canaan 
seen  in  close  friendship  with  Israel,  are  always  a  small 
body,  and  occupy  somewhat  the  position  of  pious  so- 
journers or  proselytes;  and  it  seems  contrary  to  the 
usual  way  in  which  even  the  critical  writers  explain 
events,  that  the  larger  people  should  have  adopted  the 
god  of  the  smaller  tribe. 

(5.)  Most  of  the  views  that  have  already  been  mentioned 
have  this  in  common,  that  they  place  the  adoption  of  the 
Jahaveh  religion  by  the  Hebrews  at  some  period  anterior 
to  their  entrance  into  Canaan.  We  have  now,  however, 
to  look  at  another  explanation,  which  regards  the  name 
of  Jahaveh  as  one  gradually  adopted  with  other  parts  of 
religious  belief  and  practice  from  the  Canaanites  in 
Palestine.^  As,  however,  this  view  has  been  success- 
fully attacked  by  wTiters  of  the  same  general  school  of 
criticism,  it  may  be  sufficient  to  refer  to  what  these 
latter  have  advanced  in  the  way  of  refutation.  The  ob- 
jections urged  by  Kuenen  against  Land^  deserve  special 
emphasis.  He  argues  as  follows :  {a)  It  cannot  be  de- 
nied —  Land  himself  admits  it  —  that,  in  the  struggles 
that  took  place  between  the  Canaanites  and  the  Israelites, 
there  was  involved  a  contest  between  the  gods  of  the  two 
peoples  ;  and  since  at  the  close  of  the  contest  the  Israelites 
and  their  God  were  victorious,  it  cannot  be  supposed  that 
the  deity  who  thus  asserted  his  superiority  was  originally 
of  Canaanite  origin.     Further,  Q))  not  only  have  we,  he 

1  This  view  was  independently  put  forward  by  Culenso  (Pentateuch, 
Part  II.  chap,  viii.),  who  afterwards  discovered  (Part  VII.  chap,  xix.) 
that  he  had  been  anticipated  by  Hartmann,  Yon  Bohlen,  and  Von  der 
Aim.  It  has  also  been  advocated  by  Dozy  (De  Israeliten  te  Mecca,  Germ, 
transl.,  1864,  p.  39),  Land  (Theol.  Tijdschr.,  1868,  pp.  156-170),  and 
Goldziher  (Mythology  among  the  Hebrews,  Eug.  tr.,  pp.  272,  290). 

'  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i,  pp.  398-403. 


276  .         The  Jaliaveh  Eeligion. 

contends,  in  the  names  Jochebed  (Moses'  mother),  Joshua 
(Moses'  contemporary),  and  Jonathan  (Moses'  grandson) 
— in  all  which  the  name  Jo  or  Jeho  enters  as  an  element 
— an  indication  that  the  name  was  known  to  the  Israel- 
ites independently  of  and  prior  to  their  contact  with 
Canaanites;  but  also  the  song  of  Deborah,  in  which 
Jahaveh  is  represented  as  coming  from  Seir,  furnishes  a 
plain  proof  that  the  God  of  the  Israelites  was  conceived 
as  liaving  His  original  home  outside  of  Palestine.  Lastly, 
(c)  he  argues  rightly  tliat  the  view  under  consideration 
deviates  from  the  whole  tenor  of  Israelite  tradition,  which 
gives  no  support  to  the  supposition  that  Jahaveh  was  a 
God  of  Canaanite  origin.  "  I  will  not/'  he  says,  "  assert 
that  the  latter  [i.e.,  the  Canaanite  origin  of  the  name] 
must  be  rejected  on  this  account  alone,  but  I  do  assert 
that  it  is  only  on  strong  grounds  that  it  can  be  accepted. 
In  other  words,  it  must  be  clearly  and  irrefragably  proved 
that  Jahaveh  was  really  a  god  of  the  Canaanites.  The 
evidence  with  which  this  is  attested  must  be  of  such  a 
nature  as  to  leave  no  room  for  reasonable  suspicion  of 
Israelite  or  Old  Testament  influence.  But  such  proof  as 
this  is  not  furnished."^  The  principle  which  Kuenen 
liere  lays  down  is  of  wide  application, — viz.,  that  the  clear 
testimony  of  the  religious  consciousness  of  Israel — in  other 
words,  a  persistent  tradition — is  only  to  beset  aside  on  the 
most  undoubted  positive  proof.  Kuenen  himself  is  far 
from  observing  his  own  canon,  and  Wellhausen  openly 
contradicts  it ;  ^  although  by  rejecting  it  we  cut  ourselves 
away  from  any  firm  ground  of  historical  criticism. 

^  lu  spite  of  Land's  rejoinder  in  Theol.  Tijdsehr.,  iii.  Bd.,  1869,  pp.  347-362, 
Kuenen's  position  may  be  held  as  proved.  So  Baudissin  has  on  this  point 
taken  Kuenen's  side,  Studien,  vol.  i.  pp.  213-218. 

2  Hist,  of  Israel,  pp.  318,  319.     . 


Von  Bohlens  Theory.  277 

Among  the  writers  who  seek  to  derive  the  name  of 
Jaliaveh  from  a  Canaanite  source  reference  may  be  made 
to  Von  Bohlen,^  who  would  place  the  introduction  of  the 
name  as  late  as  the  time  of  David  and  Solomon.  Some 
of  his  arguments  are  of  little  force,  and  he  has  found 
few  supporters  of  his  view ;  but  there  is  one  argument 
he  employs  which,  though  not  valid  for  his  purpose, 
directs  our  attention  to  a  fact  which  is  worth  noting. 
He  remarks  that  proper  names  compounded  with  the 
more  primitive  name  of  God,  El,  such  as  Israel,  Samuel, 
disappear  from  history  more  and  more  from  David's  time, 
and  that  names  compounded  with  Jeho  first  appear  in 
David's  reign  or  about  his  time.  Now  it  is  a  fact  that 
this  element  does  not  appear  widely  in  proper  names 
before  the  time  of  Samuel.  We  have  the  names  of 
Joash,  father  of  Gideon  (Judges  vi.  11),  Jotham,  Gideon's 
son  (Judges  ix.  5,  7),  and  Jonathan,  grandson  of  Moses 
(Judges  xviii.  1^0).  Besides  these,  we  have  two  names  before 
the  time  of  Samuel — viz.,  Joshua,  the  companion  of  Moses, 
whose  name  is  said  to  have  been  changed  from  Hoshea 
(Num.  xiii.  16),  and  Jochebed,  the  mother  of  Moses  (Exod. 
vi.  20).  In  view  of  these  it  becomes  no  longer  a  question 
as  to  the  introduction  of  the  name  Jeho  or  Jahaveh  in  the 
time  of  David,  but  how  we  are  to  explain  its  existence 
in  the  name  of  Joshua,  Moses*  contemporary,  or,  allowing 
that  to  be  an  altered  name,  in  the  name  of  the  mother 
of  Moses.  It  is  known  that  wliereas  the  Jahavist  writer 
in  Genesis  freely  uses  the  name  Jahaveh  in  reference  to 
times  antecedent  to  that  of  Moses,  the  Elohistic  writer 
retains  faithfully  the  distinction  of  the  periods ;  but  the 
name  of  the  mother  of  Moses  would  lead  us  to  conclude 
that  even  before  the  time  when  the  God  of  Israel  pro- 

1  Introduction  to  Genesis,  Hey  wood's  transl.,  vol.  i.  p.  153  f. 


27S  The  Jaliavch  Belir/ioiu 

claimed  His  sacred  name  to  Moses  at  the  bush,  the  name 
itself  had  been  known  beforehand  in  a  narrower  circle, 
or  at  least  in  the  family  of  Moses  himself.  And  this 
view  is  adopted  by  many  of  the  best  interpreters.^  On 
this  subject  Kuenen  says,  "Moses  can  scarcely  be  sup- 
posed to  have  invented  the  name  'Jahaveh';  in  all 
probability  it  was  already  in  use,  among  however  limited 
a  circle,  before  he  employed  it  to  indicate  El  Shaddai, 
the  God  of  the  sons  of  Israel;"^  and  to  the  same  effect 
Wellhausen  ^  says  that  Jahaveh  was  before  Moses  a 
designation  for  El,  and  that  he  was  originally  a  god  in 
the  family  of  Moses  or  in  the  tribe  of  Joseph. 

On  a  review  of  this  whole  inquiry,  therefore,  we  need 
not  wonder  that  Kuenen'*  comes  to  the  conclusion  that 
the  name  is  of  Israelitish  origin.  It  may  be  observed 
in  passing  that  it  is  somewhat  remarkable  that  the 
attempt  should  always  be  made  to  derive  the  religious 
conceptions  of  the  Hebrews  from  non-Hebrew  sources, 
without  supposing  that  an  influence  in  the  opposite  direc- 
tion may  have  been  exerted,  from  the  Hebrews  to  their 
non-Hebrew  neighbours.  It  is  no  doubt  the  case  that 
the  tradition  places  the  native  place  of  Abraham  in 
Chaldiea,  and  it  is  natural  to  suppose  that  the  pro- 
genitors of  the  Israelites  were  affected  by  the  thoughts 
of  the  time  and  country  from  which  they  came,  just  as 
the  nation  was  sensibly  affected  by  contact  with  Egyp- 
tians and  Canaanites.  It  must  be  remembered,  however, 
that  the  tradition  ascribes  Abraham's  departure  from  his 
native  land  to  religious  impulse,  and  Eenan  has  dwelt 

^  A  list  of  writers  who  take  this  view  is  given  by  Konig,  Hauptpro- 
bleme,  p.  27. 

-  llelig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  279  f.  ^  jjjgt.  of  Israel,  p.  433. 

*  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  398. 


Unanimous  Israelite  Tradition.  279 

upon  the  circumstance  that  religious  conceptions  remain 
more  pure  and  elevated  among  simple  nomads  than 
among  civilised  dwellers  in  cities.^  The  exhaustive  in- 
quiry, however,  that  has  been  made  by  scholars,  has  its 
justification  in  the  conclusion  to  which  it  comes,  that  there 
is  no  outside  source  from  which  it  can  be  shown  that  the 
religion  of  Jahaveh  was  derived.  The  use  of  the  name  is, 
at  least,  as  old  as  the  time  of  Moses ;  and  whether  to  any 
extent  (which  in  any  case  must  have  been  limited)  it  was 
known  before  his  time,  he  has  the  distinction  of  having 
impressed  it  upon  the  consciousness  of  the  people  of  his 
time  in  a  special  way  as  the  designation  of  their  national 
God,  under  the  aspect  in  which  He  was  distinctively 
made  known  to  them,  and  by  them  to  be  exclusively  rev- 
erenced. The  unanimous  voice  of  Israelite  tradition  is 
that  the  declaration,  "  I  am  Jahaveh  thy  God,"  was  made 
through  Moses.  There  is  not  the  least  hint  in  the  re- 
collections of  the  people  that  the  name  was  proclaimed 
by  any  other  person.  Between  Moses  and  Samuel  there 
was  no  time  at  which  we  can  conceive  it  to  have  been 
introduced ;  and  the  time  of  Samuel  itself  is  but  a  time 
of  revival  and  reformation,  after  which  it  was  not  un- 
natural that  the  name  of  the  covenant  God,  to  whom 
the  people's  heart  had  again  turned,  should  appear,  as 
has  been  pointed  out,  more  extensively  in  the  formation 
of  proper  names. 

In  opposition  to  all  attempts  at  deriving  the  name, 
or  conception  from  a  foreign  source,  and  as  showing  how 
it  was  regarded  throughout  by  the  people  of  Israel  as  a 
distinctive  possession  of  the  nation,  there  stands  the  hard 
fact  that  in  Scripture  Jahaveh  is  ever  the  God  of  Israel 
alone.      According  to  the  views  of  the  Hebrew  writers, 

^  Hist.  d'Israel,  vol.  i.  chap.  iii. 


280  TJie  Jahaveh  Beligion. 

the  non-Israelite  has  no  part  or  right  to  Jahaveh,  but 
knows  only  the  general  name  of  Elohim,  God,  or  that  of 
his  own  native  deity. ^  In  the  mouth  of  such  a  one  the 
name  Jahaveh  would  denote  a  strange  god — i.e.,  the  god 
of  the  people  of  Israel  (of.  1  Kings  xx.  23  with  v.  28). 
So  when  a  Hebrew  speaks  to  a  non-Israelite,  he  is  repre- 
sented as  using  the  name  Elohim,  and  so  also  w4ien  a  non- 
Israelite  addresses  a  Hebrew.  And  in  such  cases  it  is 
noticeable  that  the  name  Elohim  is  sometimes  construed 
with  a  plural  verb  (cf.  1  Sam.  iv.  8),  the  narrator  there- 
by assuming  for  the  time  the  standpoint  of  the  non-Heb- 
rew speaker  or  hearer. 

This  hard  fact  is  not  to  be  set  aside  by  any  vague  ety- 
mological arguments.  Even  if  it  were  shown  to  be  cer- 
tain, or  even  probable,  that  the  name  or  the  conception  of 
Jahaveh  was  got  from  some  non-Israelite  quarter  at  some 
time  or  another  in  history,  it  would  remain  beyond  dis- 
pute that,  on  the  one  hand,  the  name  thus  borrowed  dis- 
appeared from  the  language  and  thoughts  of  the  people 
from  which  it  was  derived ;  and  on  the  other,  that  it 
came  very  soon  to  be  regarded  as  the  exclusive  and 
distinguishing  possession  of  the  people  who  borrowed  it 
■ — a  supposition  which,  considering  the  attributes  with 
which  Jahaveh  was  endowed,  and  the  readiness  of  poly- 
theistic nations  to  retain  the  names  of  any  number  of 
gods,  especially  such  as  had  vindicated  themselves  as 
powerful,  is  not  to  be  entertained. 

II.  We  come  now  to  inquire  whether  we  can  determine 
what  precisely  was  the  idea  attached  to  this  name  among 
its  earliest  possessors,  so  as  to  discover,  if  possible,  where- 

^  This  is  well  brought  out  by  Tuch  in  his  Comm.  to  Genesis,  second  edi- 
tion, p.  xxxii.  He  refers  to  these  and  other  passages  :  Judges  i.  7,  vii.  14  ; 
1  Sam.  iv.  7,  8  ;  Jonah  iii.  3,  where  with  verses  5,  8,  9,  10,  compare  1 
Sam.  XXX.  15,  xxii.  3. 


Signification  of  the  Name.  281 

in  the  inner  potency  of  the  Jahaveh  religion  consisted. 
The  introduction  of  a  new  name  we  would  expect  to  be 
accompanied  with  a  new  reference,  a  new  attitude,  a  new 
mode  of  regarding  the  deity;  and  we  naturally  ask 
whether  the  name  itself  does  not  furnish  its  own  ex- 
planation. 

Those  who  seek  to  prove  that  the  religion  of  Israel  wag 
originally  a  nature  religion,  in  which  the  powers  of  nature 
were  deified,  explain  the  name  Jahaveh  in  keeping  with 
this  view.  Thus  Daumer  ^  connects  the  verb  from  which  it 
is  derived  with  the  idea  of  destroying,  and  makes  Jahaveh 
"  the  Destroyer,"  an  idea  which  suits  his  notion  that 
Jahaveh  and  Moloch  were  originally  names  for  the  same 
deity.  The  more  common  view  of  those  who  similarly 
seek  the  source  of  the  name  and  idea  in  nature  religion, 
is  that  the  verb  from  which  the  name  is  derived  means 
to  "  come  down,"  "  fall  down,"  and  then  in  its  transitive 
form  "  to  send  down  "  or  "  cast  down  "  ;  according  to  which 
Jahaveh  would  be  a  Jupiter  tonans,  the  Being  who  casts  the 
thunderbolt,  or  the  lightning,  to  the  earth.  In  support  of 
this  view,  we  are  pointed  to  the  fact  that  the  verb  in 
Arabic  [liaiva),  which,  letter  for  letter,  corresponds  to  the 
Hebrew  verb,  has  the  sense  of  gliding  freely,  and  par- 
ticularly of  gliding  or  falling  down.  This  sense,  it  is 
said,  actually  attaches  to  the  Hebrew  verb  itself  in  one 
place  at  least  (Job  xxxvii.  6),  "  He  saith  to  the  snow.  Fall 
thou  on  tlie  earth." 

The  Biblical  derivation  of  the  word,  as  is  well  known,  is 
from  the  verb  in  the  sense  "  to  be  "  or  "  become."  It  may 
be  that  from  such  a  primary  and  material  sense  as  that 
of  "  falling,"  the  verb  in  Hebrew  came  to  have  the  more 
abstract  and  secondary   meaning   of   becoming — viz.,   to 

^  Feuer  unci  Moloclidienst,  p.  11. 


282  The  Jaliaveli  Religion, 

"fall  out,"  "  happen,"  "come  to  pass,"  as  in  Gen.  vii.  6, 
"  the  flood  was  upon  the  earth."  ^  This  is  certain,  that 
the  sense  "  to  fall "  can  at  most  be  only  detected  as 
adhering  to  the  Hebrew  verb,  which  has,  however, 
appropriated  to  itself  the  one  signification  of  becom- 
ing. In  other  words,  from  the  earliest  time  at  which 
we  know  the  language,  this  verb  was  the  usual  one 
employed  to  express  the  idea  of  "being,"  not,  however, 
in  the  abstract  sense  of  "  existence,"  but  in  the  sense  of 
"  becoming " ;  there  was  no  other  verb  in  the  language 
with  that  signification ;  the  meaning  of  "  falling,"  if  it 
originally  belonged  to  it,  had  almost  disappeared ;  and 
another  verb  altogether  was  employed  to  express  that  idea. 
We  can  quite  easily  comprehend  how  a  verb  "  to  fall," 
and  then  "to  send  down,"  could,  among  a  polytheistic 
people,  or  even  a  monotheistic  people  at  a  primitive  stage 
of  culture,  furnish  the  starting-point  for  a  name  of  the 
deity.  He  would  then  be  the  Being  who  "  sends  down  " 
rain,  or  thunder,  or  whatever  it  might  be.  The  name 
would  stand  on  the  same  level,  or,  I  should  say,  a  lower 
one,  than  such  names  as  El,  or  Shaddai,  the  "  strong  one," 
or  Baal,  Adon,  "  lord,"  or  Molcch,  "  ruler " ;  for  any  one 
of  these  gives  a  fuller  significance  to  the  Being  so  named. 
Against  this  origin  of  the  name  among  the  Hebrews, 
however,  we  have,  besides  the  fact  that  there  is  no  proof 
whatever  of  the  Hebrews  adopting  a  god  of  that  name 
from  Arabic  tribes  as  Stade  will  have  it,  or  of  their 
attaching  such  an  idea  to  the  name   of   their  national 

•*  For  the  idea  of  being  and  becoming,  the  Hebrew  uses  almost  exclu- 
eively  Jiayah  riM,  hawah  ilin  being  found  in  that  sense  only  in  poetic 
archaic  passages  ;  as  in  Gen.  xxvii.  29,  where  Jacob  is  blessed  by  Isaac, 
*'  Be  lord  over  thy  brethren,"  also  Isa.  xvi.  4,  the  oracle  on  Moab.  Later 
"writers  are  influenced  by  Aramaic. 


Derivation  of  the  Name.  283 

god,  the  stronger  fact  just  alluded  to,  that  the  verb 
had  appropriated  to  itself  the  sense  of  le,  hecome,  which 
would  be  transitively  to  cause.  That  is  to  say,  assuming 
that  such  a  name  was  formed  or  introduced  at  some  his- 
toric time,  at  some  time  when  the  language  contained  the 
roots  or  stems  it  now  possesses,  the  mere  utterance  of 
the  name  would  call  up  in  the  mind  of  the  hearer  the 
idea  of  being,  becoming,  causing.  And  tliis  is  very  much 
the  same  as  saying  that  the  person  who  introduced  it 
wished  to  convey  by  it  that  meaning,  since  he  could  not 
but  have  seen  that  it  would  suggest  such  an  idea.  To 
attach  to  the  name  the  other  and  more  physical  signifi- 
cation, would  necessitate  some  proof  that  the  name  is  of 
much  older  origin  than  the  time  of  Moses,  older  than  the 
language  in  the  form  in  which  we  have  it ;  and  that — if 
the  primary  meaning  of  descender  or  sender  down  attached 
to  it— there  must  have  been  a  constant  effort  in  the  mind 
to  retain  this  antiquarian  idea,  and  to  exclude  another 
which  was  soon  suggested  and  which  was  more  exalted. 
For  it  is  a  point  of  the  greatest  significance  here,  that  the 
other  names  of  God  found  among  the  Hebrews  and  their 
neighbours  are  connected  with  stems  which  are  in  the 
language  and  have  a  precise  and  intelligible  meaning. 
On  this  line  of  reasoning,  then,  I  should  conclude,  that 
from  the  time  that  the  verb  to  be,  to  become,  was  a  regu- 
lar constituent  element  of  the  language,  the  name  Jaha- 
veh  must  of  necessity,  if  it  was  later  than  the  verb,  have 
partaken  of  that  signification.  Either  the  name  Jahaveh 
was  directly  formed  from  an  existent  verb  "  to  be " ;  or 
it  was  formed  from  a  verb  having  the  meaning  to  descend 
which  meaning,  however,  was,  if  not  obliterated,  yet  cer- 
tainly overshadowed,  at  tlie  earliest  known  stage  of  the 
language,  by  another  sense. 


28  4  The  Jahaveli  Eeligion. 

Of  course  this  argument  proceeds  on  the  assumption 
that  those  who  used  the  name,  or  at  least  the  thoughtful 
part  of  the  nation  when  they  used  it,  attached  to  it  some 
signification,  which  is  surely  very  likely,  and  in  analogy 
with  such  names  as  Moloch  and  Baal,  which  could  not 
but  keep  in  the  mind  the  ideas  of  kingship  or  lordship. 
It  would  surely  be  an  extraordinary  supposition  that  the 
Hebrews  had  got  hold  of  a  non-Hebrew  name  for  their 
deity  which  tliey  used  for  a  time  without  attaching  to  it 
any  sense  at  all,  and  then  read  into  it  a  meaning  suggested 
by  its  resemblance  to  a  common  verb  in  the  language. 
It  is  not  certainly  to  be  concluded  that  the  bare  etymo- 
logical meaning  and  no  more  would  always  adhere  to  a 
word ;  but  if  this  name  Jahaveh  starts  from  the  idea  of 
being,  or  must  have  suggested  that  idea  at  its  first  use, 
the  expansion  of  the  conception  in  the  minds  of  thinks 
ing  persons  would  be  in  the  line  of  the  primary  meaning. 

Now,  as  we  have  already  seen,  the  name  was  introduced 
at  what  the  tradition  makes  a  pretty  advanced  stage  in  -the 
development  of  the  religion.  By  the  time  of  Moses  the 
whole  patriarchal  phase  uf  it  had  run  its  course;  and,  ac- 
cording to  the  Biblical  account,  the  earlier  conception  of 
the  deity  had  been  expressed  by  the  terms  El  and  Shaddai, 
embodying  the  simpler  ideas  of  strength,  power.  Stade 
himself  tells  us  that  in  the  pre-Mosaic  religion,  the  name 
El  was  used  to  denote  the  native  spirit  or  spirits,  and  the 
name  Elohim  is  certainly  old.  And  just  as  the  abstract 
idea  of  being,  or  transitively  the  idea  of  causing,  is  one 
that  comes  comparatively  late  in  consciousness,  or  at  least 
does  not  come  at  the  primitive  stage,  so  the  introduction 
of  the  name  of  Jahaveh,  "  He  who  will  be,"  or  "  who  will 
cause  to  be,"  marks  a  point  of  advance  in  the  conception  of 
the  national  God.     It  is  therefore  fitly  placed  in  the  time 


IsraeVs  God  from  Egypt,  285 

of  Moses ;  for  it  cannot  be  denied  that,  as  the  whole  con- 
sciousness of  Israel  looked  back  to  the  period  of  the  exo- 
dus as  a  new  era  in  their  national  life,  so  the  belief  that 
Jahaveh  was  their  God  from  Egypt  onwards,  as  it  is  ex- 
pressed by  Hosea,  was  deeply  rooted  in  tlie  nation's  mind 
and  heart. 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  frank  recognition  of  this  fact, 
so  firmly  embedded  in  the  national  life  and  literature, 
would  go  far  to  explain  the  striking  phenomena  which 
criticism  has  brought  into  clear  light ;  and,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  the  refusal  to  accept  it  frankly  has  led  modern 
writers  to  the  precarious  shifts  and  extravagant  positions 
which  mark  the  course  of  their  disquisitions.  They  look 
■for  development,  but  they  will  not  look  for  it  at  the  right 
place.  Instead  of  accepting  the  fact,  that  in  the  patri- 
archal period  there  was  already  a  knowledge  of  God,  at 
least  on  a  level  with,  and  presumably  higher  than,  that  of 
the  polytheistic  nations  around  Israel,  they  insist  on  find- 
ing the  transition  from  the  barest  animal  religion  going  on 
in  a  period  after  that  stage  had,  for  the  enlightened  part 
of  the  nation,  passed  away.  Instead  of  accepting  the  fact 
that  the  name  Jahaveh  denotes  a  high  stage  achieved, 
they  insist  on  starting  with  that  name  as  embodying  the 
most  primary  conceptions ;  and  in  tracing  the  develop- 
ment of  the  conception  in  the  hands  of  the  prophets,  they 
neglect  the  clue  given  to  the  development  in  the  posses- 
sion of  the  name  itself.  I  take  my  stand  upon  the  as- 
sumption that  this  name  must  have  had  some  meaning, 
some  suggestion,  to  the  thinking  portion  of  the  people, 
and  must  have,  to  an  appreciable  extent,  controlled  the 
conceptions  of  God  which  were  raised  in  the  mind  by  the 
mention  of  the  name.  There  were  other  names — El,  Elo- 
him,  Shaddai,  Elyon,  Baal,  Molech- — all  of  which  may  have 


286  The  Jahaveh  Religion. 

been  used  to  denote  deity ;  but  each  and  all  of  them  have 
a  specific  meaning  attached  to  them,  and  Jahaveh  must 
have  also  had  its  meaning,  a  specific  meaning ;  and  being 
a  special  proper  name,  must  have  been  intended  to  denote 
all  the  others  put  together,  nay,  more  than  all  the  others 
combined,  else  there  would  have  been  no  reason  for  the 
introduction  of  a  new  name.  The  question  is.  What  was 
that  meaning  ?  If  the  name  meant  merely  "  the  one  that 
sends  down  rain  "  or  "  thunderer,"  I  submit  that  that  does 
not  go  beyond  El  or  Shaddai,  and  would  not  therefore  en- 
title Jahaveh  to  be  selected  as  the  highest  name  that  the 
best  could  bestow  on  God.  There  is  the  verb  "  to  become  " 
lying  patent  as  a  verb  with  which  to  connect  a  name  which 
comes  to  supplement  or  to  comprehend  all  the  other  names. 
And  the  name  is  put  at  the  very  period  when  the  nation's 
consciousness  of  a  destiny  before  it  is  represented  as  ap- 
pearing. All  this  cannot  be  fortuitous,  nor  is  it  likely  to 
have  occurred  as  a  happy  thought  to  the  early  writers 
who  have  left  us  these  traditions.  The  conclusion  seems 
well  justified,  that,  with  the  use  of  the  name  Jahaveh, 
the  idea  seized  the  mind  of  Moses  and  his  successors  that 
the  God  they  worshipped  was  one  of  ever  -  developing 
potency,  an  ever  self-manifesting,  ever  actively-defending 
God,  whose  character  was  not  so  much  denoted  by  a 
quality  as  by  a  constant  activity,  or  rather  (judged  by  the 
analogy  of  similar  personal  names)  by  a  person  ever  active ; 
that  in  fact,  as  a  nation  does  not  die,  so  their  national  God 
would  ever  be  with  them.  The  name  comes  in  at  a  definite 
historical  crisis  in  the  nation's  life,  and  was  meant  to  in- 
dicate that  the  deity  so  named  was  concerned,  not  merely 
with  natural  phenomena,  but  with  national  and  historical 
events. 

Let  us  try  to  think  of  Moses  proclaiming  to  his  people 


The  God  of  the  Patriarchs,  287 

a  new  name  that  they  had  never  heard  before,  or  heard 
only  as  the  name  of  the  sender  of  the  lightning,  and  his 
saying  to  Israel — and  with  effect — "  this  Thunderer  is  to 
be  your  only  God  for  all  time  coming,"  The  question 
would  naturally  arise,  "  Who  is  Jahaveh  that  ice  should 
serve  Him  ?  We  know  what  is  meant  by  a  '  Strong  One,' 
a  'Lord,'  a  'Master,'  a  *Most  High  One'  (for  kindred 
nations  had  called  their  gods  by  such  names  as  far  back 
as  we  have  knowledge,  and  why  should  the  Hebrews  be 
placed  beneath  them  in  intelligence  ?).  But  who  is  the 
sender  of  rain  or  of  thunder  any  more  to  us  than  the  deity 
we  already  worship  ?  What  is  He  to  us,  or  what  are  we 
to  Him  in  particular,  that  we  should  be  thus  wedded  to- 
gether?" The  only  answer  that  he  could  conceivably 
have  given  to  such  most  obvious  questions  is,  that  Ja- 
haveh had  done  something  for  them  to  claim  their  regard. 
People  do  not  set  up  gods  for  nothing.  What  then  had 
Jahaveh  done  for  them  ?  Wellhausen  comes  to  our  aid 
(though  Stade  refuses  to  go  so  far),  and  tells  us  that  the 
people  had  experienced  His  power  in  the  deliverance  from 
Egypt.^  This  is  a  reasonable  account  to  give ;  but  it 
only  raises  another  question,  "  Who  was  this  that  inter- 
fered on  behalf  of  a  nation  of  slaves  in  Egypt,  and  why 
did  He  interfere  ? "  And  the  only  answer  that  all  these 
questions  admit  of  is  just  the  Biblical  answer,  "The  God 
of  our  fathers  hath  appeared  to  me  :  "  in  other  words,  there 
is  a  linking  on  of  the  deliverance  of  the  present  to  the 
recollections  of  the  past ;  the  God  of  Abraham  is  not  dead, 
but  alive  and  acting  on  behalf  of  Abraham's  seed;  and 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  pp.  429-433  ;  cf.  here  Kuenen,  Relig.  of 
Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  276  fF.  Stade  will  not  even  admit  that  the  Israelites,  in 
any  appreciable  sense,  ever  sojourned  in  Egypt.  "If  any  Hebrew  clan 
dwelt  in  Egypt,"  he  says,  "no  one  knows  its  name." — Geschichte,  vol.  i, 
p.  129. 


283  The  Jahaveh  Religion. 

ill  commemoration  of  the  new  deliverance,  and  to  mark 
a  new  era,  He  receives  or  adopts  a  new  name,  distinctive 
from  mere  appellations  of  deity  generally,  and  the  God 
of  pre-Mosaic  times  is  the  same  God  in  fuller  manifesta- 
tion still.  Moses,  says  Prof.  A.  B.  Davidson,  "stamped 
an  impress  upon  the  people  of  Israel  which  was  never 
effaced,  and  planted  seeds  in  the  mind  of  the  nation  which 
the  crop  of  thorns  that  sprang  up  after  his  death  could 
not  altogether  choke.  Of  course,  even  he  did  not  create 
a  nation  or  a  religious  consciousness  in  the  sense  of  mak- 
ing it  out  of  nothing.  AVhen  he  appealed  to  the  people 
in  Egypt  in  the  name  of  Jehovah  their  God,  he  did  not 
conjure  with  an  abstraction  or  a  novelty.  The  people 
had  some  knowledge  of  Jehovah,  some  faith  in  Him,  or 
His  name  would  not  have  awakened  them  to  religious  or 
■national  life.  In  matters  like  this  we  never  can  get  at 
the  beginning.  The  patriarchal  age,  with  its  knowledge 
of  God,  is  not  altogether  a  shadow,  otherwise  the  history 
of  the  exodus  would  be  a  riddle.  Moses  found  materials, 
but  he  passed  a  new  fire  through  them,  and  welded  them 
into  a  unity;  he  breathed  a  spirit  into  the  people,  which 
animated  it  for  all  time  to  come ;  and  this  spirit  can  have 
been  no  other  than  the  spirit  that  animated  himself."^ 
The  importance  of  dwelling  on  this  question  of  the 
meaning  attached  to  the  name  of  Israel's  national  God 
in  its  initial  conception  and  at  its  first  use  will  be  self- 
evident.  It  brings  to  a  point  the  sharp  contrast  between 
the  Biblical  account  of  the  matter  and  the  views  presented 
by  writers  of  the  modern  critical  school.  We  may  say, 
in  a  general  way,  that  the  various  aspects  of  the  pre-pro- 
phetic  religion,  as  we  have  seen  them  put  forward  in  the 
^preceding  chapters,  have  this  in  common,  that  they  rep- 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  42. 


Jahaveh  and  the  Elim.  289 

resent  the  Jahaveh  of  pre -prophetic  times  as  a  being 
rather  of  might  than  of  moral  greatness,  a  nature-God 
rather  than  a  God  of  nature,  the  only  national  God  of 
Israel  indeed,  yet,  except  in  this  particular,  very  little 
if  anything  different  from  the  gods  of  the  surrounding 
nations  even  in  the  estimation  of  His  own  worshippers. 
Such  representations  of  Jahaveh  are  the  natural  develop- 
ment of  the  initial  conception  with  which  these  writers 
start.  Wellhausen  says^  that  "no  essential  distinction 
was  felt  to  exist  between  Jehovah  and  El,  any  more 
than  between  Asshur  and  El;"  and  Stade  tells  us  that 
El  denotes  a  superhuman  being,  though  not  sharply  sep- 
arated from  nature  in  which  he  operates.  Each  place 
had  its  El,  and  the  collective  Elim  or  Elohim  was  the 
sum  of  these,  or  the  expression  in  a  plural  of  majesty, 
of  the  power  of  these  superhuman  beings.^  According 
to  the  view  of  these  writers,  then,  the  name  Jahaveh, 
given  originally  to  a  family  or  tribal  god,  either  of  the 
family  of  Moses  or  tribe  of  Joseph,  as  Wellhausen  ^  sup- 
poses, or  of  the  tribe  of  the  Kenites  as  Stade  thinks, 
implied  no  more  than  El ;  only,  having  become  current 
within  a  powerful  circle,  it  "  was  on  that  account  all  the 
more  fitted  to  become  the  designation  of  a  national  God." 
But  if  there  is  any  force  at  all  in  the  considerations 
that  have  been  put  forward,  that  this  name  Jahaveh  is  not 
of  foreign  but  of  Israelitish  origin,  that  as  a  separate  and 
new  name  it  must  have  indicated  something  more  than 
other  names  already  existing,  and  that  in  its  derivation 
or  immediate  suggestion  it  had  the  sense  of  "  becoming," 
then  we  must  demand  for  the  initial  stage  of  the  Jahaveh 
religion  a  much  higher  level  than  the  critical  school  allows. 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  433.  2  gtade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  428. 

3  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  433. 


290  Tlic  Jahaveh  Religion. 

In  addition  to  this  general  remark,  there  are  the  following 
points  again  to  be  insisted  on : — 

(1.)  There  is  absolutely  no  proof  that  Jahaveh  was  orig- 
inally the  name  of  a  family  or  tribal  god  in  the  sense 
understood  by  these  writers.  Even  if  the  name  of  the 
mother  of  Moses  be  taken  as  an  indication  that  the  name 
was  known  in  the  circle  of  his  family,  there  is  no  proof 
that  it  denoted  no  more  than  El  or  a  superhuman  nature- 
spirit. 

(2.)  And  then  no  reason  is  assigned  for  the  name 
Jahaveh  superseding  El  or  the  Elim,  if,  according  to  the 
hypothesis,  it  signified  no  more  than  these  names.  Dill- 
mann  remarks^  that  wherever  an  actual  change  in  the 
religion  of  a  people  takes  place,  there  is  ever  a  histori- 
cal consciousness  of  the  fact  preserved  among  them.  The 
assertion  that  this  name  was  a  special  name  of  El,  which 
had  become  current  in  a  powerful  circle,  and  on  that  ac- 
count was  all  the  more  fitted  to  become  the  designation  of 
a  national  god,  is,  in  the  first  place,  destitute  of  historical 
proof,  and,  in  the  second  place,  most  improbable.  If  the 
introduction  of  the  name  was  connected  with  some  strik- 
ing event,  such  as  the  exodus,  we  should  expect  the  name 
to  mark  an  advance — as  the  Biblical  writers  represent — on 
the  conception ;  but  according  to  the  modern  view,  Jaha- 
veh still  remains  a  nature-God :  although  a  national  God, 
His  attributes  are  almost  entirely  physical. 

(3.)  In  the  next  place,  though  the  proofs  from  Scripture 
which  Stade,  for  example,  advances  in  support  of  his  pic- 
ture of  the  character  of  the  pre-prophetic  Jahaveh,  are 
selected  and  manipulated  in  the  extraordinary  fashion  to 
which  reference  has  already  been  made,^  yet  it  is  exceed- 

1  Ursprung  der  Alttestl.  Religion,  p.  6,  quoted  by  Baudissin,  Jahve  et 
Moloch,  p.  77.  ^  In  chap.  viii.  p.  205. 


Elijah  at  Sarepta.  ^^^-^J^^^"^* 

ingly  difficult  to  form  a  conception  of  the  character  he 
seeks  to  delineate.  He  roams  at  will  over  Genesis,  the 
historical  books,  and  even  the  prophets,  finding  in  later 
productions  proofs  of  a  low  tone,  and  in  the  earlier  books 
proofs  of  a  high  tone  of  religious  thought,  till  it  is  abso- 
lutely impossible  to  make  out  what  the  initial  conception 
of  Jahaveh,  in  his  theory,  could  have  been.  An  ex- 
ample may  be  taken  from  his  treatment  of  the  story  of 
Elijah.  At  one  time,  in  the  midst  of  his  argument  to 
prove  that  Jahaveh's  power  was  confined  to  His  own 
land,  he  tells  ^  us  that  Elijah,  who  fights  valiantly  in 
the  land  of  Israel  against  the  worship  of  Baal,  yet  goes 
and  lives  with  a  widow  at  Sarepta,  who  must  have 
been  a  Baal- worshipper,  and  eats  her  food,  which  would 
be  consecrated  by  offering  to  Baal — touclies  for  which 
there  is  absolutely  no  warrant,  and  which  make  the 
character  of  the  "  prophet  of  fire,"  as  drawn  by  the  nar- 
rator, simply  incomprehensible.  Presently  he  tells  us 
that  in  this  same  story  of  Elijah  the  belief  finds  expres- 
sion that  Jahaveh  accompanies  His  worshippers  in  their 
wanderings,  for  He  performs  miracles  at  Sarepta  at  the 
prophet's  request,  and  sends  him  back  to  his  own  land.^ 
This  same  belief,  he  says,  is  expressed  in  the  promise  to 
be  with  Jacob  (Gen.  xxviii.  15,  J.),  in  His  being  with 
Joseph  in  Egypt  (Gen.  xxxix.  2,  J.),  and  in  His  going 
down  to  Egypt  with  Jacob  (Gen.  xlvi.  3  f.,  J.  and  E.) 
And  in  order  to  prove  the  same  thing  he  refers  to 
a  passage  as  late  as  Isaiah  xix.,  where  the  prophet 
speaks  of  Jahaveh  riding  on  a  swift  cloud  and  coming 
to  Egypt,  and  tlie  idols  being  moved  at  his  presence. 
Similarly  he  proceeds  in  speaking  of  Jahaveh's  power. 
The  conceptions  of  all-mightiness  and  omniscience,  we  are 

1  Stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  430.  2  ^^j^j^  p   431 


292  The  Jahaveh  Relifjion. 

told,  are  not  yet  reached.  That  He  was  not  regarded  as 
knowhig  all  things  is  seen  from  the  patriarchal  stories, 
which  speak,  for  example,  of  God  going  down  to  Sodom 
to  see  whether  its  condition  was  such  as  the  cry  repre- 
sented it.^  Still  the  same  God  knows  Sarah's  thoughts, 
and  the  belief  in  the  oracle  shows  that  He  was  regarded 
as  having  a  knowledge  of  secrets  such  as  children  ascribe 
to  God.  His  power  came  in  the  same  way  to  be  repre- 
sented by  the  religious  sentiment  as  adequate  to  anything, 
as  appears  in  the  saying,  "  Is  anything  too  hard  for  Jaha- 
veh ? "  (Gen.  xviii.  14)  ;  and  in  that  other  saying,  "  There 
is  no  restraint  to  Jahaveh  to  save  by  many  or  by  few " 
(1  Sam.  xiv.  6).  So  He  performs  wonders,  shakes  the 
earth,  overthrows  cities,  punishes  His  land  with  famine 
and  plague,  and  slays  men  without  any  apparent  disease. 
One  other  example  may  be  given  of  Stade's  reasoning. 
The  preponderance  of  the  idea  of  might  in  the  conception 
of  God,  he  says,  combined  with  the  fact  that  in  a  primitive 
age  the  difference  between  evil  and  misfortune  was  not 
apprehended,  hindered  men  from  regarding  Jahaveh  as  a 
Being  who  always  acted  for  moral  ends.  Traces  of  a 
higher  conception  are  not  indeed  wanting  in  the  pre- 
prophetic  age.  Jahaveh,  as  the  defender  of  His  people 
and  of  the  land,  is  the  guardian  of  moral  customs,  the 
avenger  of  broken  covenants,  and  so  far  as  concerns  the 
relations  of  one  Israelite  to  another.  His  will  is  the  ex- 
pression of  moral  and  just  rule.^  Thus  He  avenges  a 
broken  oath,  and  fulfils  the  prayer  of  the  unjustly  op- 
pressed. Especially  is  He  the  avenger  of  innocent  blood, 
which  cries  to  Him  from  the  ground  (Gen.  iv.  10,  xlii. 
22,  E.)  So,  as  He  is  the  God  of  the  land,  He  maintains 
law  and  order  in  it,  punishing — e.g.,  Sodom  and  Gomorrah 

1  Stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  432.  2  ibid.,  p.  434. 


Jahavch  the  Author  of  Evil.  293 

— for  breaking  it.  By  such  advances  as  these  the  idea  of 
holiness  was  enlarged  and  purified  in  later  times.  But  in 
earlier  times  these  ideas  did  not  extend  to  the  general 
course  of  events,  and  to  the  relation  of  Israelites  to  non- 
Israelites  and  the  surrounding  world.  In  such  matters 
moral  conceptions  are  so  little  apparent,  tliat  God  is  the 
author  even  of  evil.  Men  had  not  reached  the  belief  in  a 
world  in  which  imperfection  was  necessarily  involved,  and 
of  evil  left  for  a  time  even  for  the  sake  of  the  good.  Ac- 
cordingly, when  we  would  say  God  permits  this  or  that, 
the  ancient  Israelite  said  straight  out  that  Jahaveh  did 
it.^  Evil  and  misfortune  are  expressed  by  one  word,  ra  ; 
and  Amos  says  (iii.  6),  "  Is  there  evil  in  the  city,  and  Jaha- 
veh has  not  done  it  ? "  And  not  only  outward  calamities, 
but  the  evil  passions  and  inner  impulses  of  men,  are 
ascribed  to  Jahaveh ;  and,  as  among  heathen  nations.  He 
is  believed  to  make  people  mad,  or  leads  them  on  to  do 
things  which  will  bring  down  His  own  wrath.  Thus  the 
schism  of  the  kingdoms,  the  greatest  misfortune  to  Israel, 
was  from  Jahaveh  (1  Kings  xii.  15).  So  He  sends  a  lying 
spirit  among  the  prophets  of  Ahab,  that  the  king  may  be 
led  to  go  confidently  against  Eamoth-Gilead,  and  only 
the  prophet  Micah  remains  unmoved  (1  Kings  xxii.  20  ff.) 
So  He  sends  an  evil  spirit  between  Abimelech  and  the 
Shechemites.  And  that  this  is  not  merely  or  in  all  cases 
a  punishment  for  former  transgression,  is  proved  by  the 
remarkable  passage  (1  Sam.  xxvi.  19)  in  which  David 
says  to  Saul,  "  If  Jahaveh  hath  stirred  thee  up  against 
me,  let  him  accept  an  offering ;  but  if  it  be  men,  let  them 
be  accursed  of  Jahaveh." 

This  kind  of  reasoning  may  be  carried  out  indefinitely, 
but  though  it  may  make  a  big  book,  it  does  not  amount 

^  Stade,  Geschichte,  vol,  i.  p,  435. 


294  The  Jahaveli  Eeligion. 

to  a  strong  argument.  Stade  does  not  or  will  not  see 
that  by  thus  heaping  together  texts  referring  to  different 
periods  within  or  beyond  the  prophetic  period  indiscrimi- 
nately, he  is  destroying  the  position  he  holds  that  the 
prophetic  religion  is  an  advance  on  the  pre-prophetic. 
And  when  he  finds  in  such  a  writer  as  Amos,  or  even 
Isaiah,  instances  of  the  lower  type  of  conception,  what 
becomes  of  the  position  that  higher  types  found  in  Genesis, 
e.g.,  are  "  signs  of  advance  "  or  "  breaking  down  "  of  narrow 
views  ?  What  we  want  to  know  is  the  alleged  initial 
stage  at  which  the  national  God  was  no  more  than  El,  a 
nature-God ;  and  instead  of  this  we  get  this  mixing  up  of 
early  and  late  which  is  quite  unintelligible.  The  truth 
is,  the  difficulty  he  finds  in  reconciling  the  contradictory 
or  conflicting  statements  of  contemporaneous  authorities 
arises  simply  from  the  fact  that  the  "  higher "  or  moral 
conception  is  present  from  the  first.  In  opposition  to  all 
this  kind  of  reasoning  I  would  take  my  stand  upon  the 
reasonable  principle,  that  in  writings  belonging  practi- 
cally to  tlie  same  period  the  lower  expressions  are  to 
be  controlled  by  the  higher,  and  that  one  statement 
in  plain  terms  should  outweigh  any  amount  of  meta- 
phorical or  figurative  language.  The  Hebrew  writers 
employ  the  boldest  anthropomorphisms,  for  example; 
but  as  Stade  himself  says,  this  was  a  necessity  for  people 
unaccustomed  to  philosophical  speculation :  it  is  more,  it 
is  a  necessity  of  religious  language.  Nor  are  they  afraid 
to  employ  the  most  simple  and  childlike  expressions ;  but 
there  is  ever  the  absence  of  gross  conceptions,  and  ever 
and  anon  the  utterance  of  the  most  exalted  ideas,  showing 
what  the  essential  character  of  Jahaveh,  in  their  opinion, 
was.  Side  by  side  with  the  boldest  anthropomorphisms 
are  found  the  most  spiritual  expressions,  and  the  same 


Loiuer  Expressions  controlled  hy  Higher.  295 

writers  who  speak  of  Jaliaveli  as  having  a  local  seat 
ascribe  to  Him  control  over  all  the  nations  of  the  world. 
In  view  of  all  tliis  it  is  sheer  trifling  to  explain  the  one 
set  of  expressions  as  remnants  of  a  belief  in  a  nature- 
God,  and  the  other  as  signs  of  a  breaking  down  of  nar- 
row views.  The  Hebrew  writers,  from  the  earliest  times 
at  which  we  have  access  to  their  words,  are  on  a  higher 
plane  of  thought  than  the  modern  critics  will  allow ;  and 
just  because  they  are  so  firmly  fixed  there,  they  do  not 
hesitate  to  employ  the  boldest  pictorial  or  metaphorical 
language  to  express  their  thoughts. 


296 


CHAPTEE     XII. 

ETHIC   MONOTHEISM. 

The  great  objection  to  the  modern  account  of  the  Jahaveh  rdigion — /.  Neces- 
sity of  postulating  moral  elements  in  Jahaveh'' s  character,  and  how  their 
origin  is  explained  by  Stade — Distinctive  features  in  the  Jahaveh  reli- 
gion as  stated  by  him — Jealousy,  and  sole  reverence — Examination  of 
this:  (1)  Are  these  really  distinctive?  (2)  //  they  are  really  so,  the 
theory  is  at  fault,  for  no  sufficient  explanation  of  their  origin  is  given — 
//.  Transition  to  ethic  monotheism — Distinction  of  monolatry  and  mono- 
theism— Proofs  of  monolatry — Jephthah — First  Commandment  —Nam- 
if^J  of  gods  of  the  nations — Kuencn's  argument  examined — Popular 
conception  of  power  nourished  by  political  events — Agreement  of  prophets 
with  popular  idea  in  fundamental  principles — Rise  beyond  this  on  the 
appearance  of  the  Assyrian  power — Appeal  again  to  earliest  writing 
projjhets,  in  whom  monotheism  is  not  nascent,  but  fully  developed — The 
prophets  claimed  to  be  the  true  interpreters  of  the  fundamental  prin- 
ciples of  the  religion — The  attribute  of  grace  or  love  which  is  made 
central  by  Hosea,  gives  the  explanation  of  the  origin  of  the  popular 
and  the  prophetic  views. 

The  difficulties  in  the  way  of  accepting  the  modern 
account  are  seen  to  be  greatest  when  we  inquire  what 
it  was  that  distinguished  the  Jahaveh  religion  from 
the  religions  of  neighbouring  nations.  We  are  told 
ad  nauseam  the  points  in  which  it  resembled  them ;  one 
feature  after  another  is  toned  down  to  the  level  of  nature 
or  national  religion.     Yet  the  pre-prophetic  religion  must 


Slades  Points  of  Distinction,  297 

have  had  something  distinctive  to  mark  out  the  Israel- 
ites from  their  neighbours,  and  give  them  the  pride  in 
their  national  faith  which  they  possessed.  It  must  have 
contained,  moreover,  some  germ  which  by  way  of  devel- 
opment enabled  it  to  rise  to  the  so-called  ethic  mono- 
theism of  the  prophets.  We  must  now  examine  the 
modern  theory  as  to  these  elements. 

I.  Stade,  in  drawing  his  picture  of  the  pre-prophetic 
Jahaveh  as  a  national  deity  evolved  from  a  nature-God,  is 
bound,  as  we  have  seen,  to  put  in  here  and  there  features 
of  a  more  elevated  and  moral  character.  All  tliat  he  can 
say  as  to  the  origin  of  these  higher  conceptions  is,  that 
they  arise  not  from  mental  reflection,  but  from  religious 
feeling  and  impulse.  In  this  way,  for  example,  "  the  feel- 
ing arises"  that  Jahaveh,  although  the  God  of  the  land  of 
Israel  only,  will  accompany  His  worshipper  into  a  foreign 
country ;  and  also  "  the  confidence  arises  "  that  He  will  be 
more  powerful  than  the  gods  of  the  heathen,  just  as  Israel 
itself,  when  in  captivity,  bursts  its  bonds.  These  two  ideas 
blend  into  the  conviction  that  Jahaveh,  brought  willingly 
or  by  force  into  a  strange  land,  will  there  show  His  power 
by  inflicting  evil  on  the  heathen  gods,  as  happened  to 
Dagon  at  Gath,  and  as  is  indicated  in  the  passage  of  Isaiah 
to  which  reference  has  already  been  made.  And,  more  par- 
ticularly, he  strives  to  find,  amid  all  the  features  that  are 
common  to  Jahaveh  and  the  heathen  gods,  some  distinctive 
characteristics  which  will  ensure  the  Jahaveh  religion  hav- 
ing an  independent  existence  and  a  possible  development. 
In  this  connection  he  lays  particular  stress  on  two  things : — 

(1.)  While  the  early  Israelite  conceptions  of  Jahaveh's 
power  and  holiness  are  in  strict  analogy  with  the  lieathen 
conception  of  their  gods,  there  is  one  element,  he  says, 
which   distinguishes  the  religion  of  Israel.     The  anger 


298  Ethic  Monotheism, 

of  Jahaveh  takes  the  form  of  jealousy  of  the  worship  of 
any  other  God ;  which  worship  He  avenges  and  punishes. 
And  this  idea,  which  attains  its  full  development  in  the 
teaching  of  the  prophets,  is  an  element  of  the  Mosaic  re- 
ligion. On  Stade's  theory  the  power  of  Jahaveh  is  first 
of  all  thought  of  as  a  terrifying  attribute,  for  He  is  the  God 
of  the  storm,  and  the  idea  is  not  for  some  time  reached 
that  divine  might  must  be  exercised  on  the  side  of  good. 
His  holiness  also  is  merely  majesty  jealous  of  its  honour, 
and  insisting  on  due  reverence,  so  that  the  bounds  be- 
tween Him  and  man  are  not  to  be  trespassed  with  im- 
punity. Instances  illustrating  this  are  found  in  the  judg- 
ments that  befell  the  people  of  Beth-shemesh  and  Uzzah, 
for  looking  into  or  touching  the  ark,  the  symbol  of  His  pre- 
sence ;  and  the  idea  is  found  as  late  as  Isaiah  (viii.  14), 
who  speaks  of  a  sanctuary  as  an  object  of  terror.^  This 
representation  of  Jahaveh,  however,  assumes  a  milder 
form  and  kindlier  aspect  from  the  fact  that  He  is  Israel's 
God,  and  will  defend  His  own  people.  But  it  is  to  be 
noted  that,  while  He  is  true  and  faithful  to  His  own,  the 
counterpart  of  His  faithfulness  to  Israel  is  His  anger 
against  Israel's  foes.  This  is  seen  chiefly  in  war.  Tlie 
oldest  monument  of  Hebrew  poetry,  the  song  of  Deborah, 
represents  Him  as  coming  from  Sinai  to  discomfit  the 
army  of  Sisera,  and  Meroz  is  cursed  because  it  did  not 
come  to  the  help  of  the  Lord  against  the  mighty.^  A 
trace  of  the  same  idea  is  found  in  the  title  of  the  '  Book 
of  the  Wars  of  Jahaveh,'  and  in  Abigail's  speaking  of 
David  lighting  Jahaveh's  battles.  So  the  ark,  according 
to  the  oldest  views,  was  taken  into  the  battle,  and  Jahaveh 
was  the  "  Lord  of  hosts." 

(2.)  Another  fundaniental  point  of  difference  between 

1  Stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  434.  2  l\,{^\^^  p.  437^ 


JaJiavch  not  a  Primus  inter  Pares.  299 

the  pre-prophetic  religion  of  Israel  and  heathen  systems, 
according  to  Stade,  is  this :  ^  Whereas  in  Greece,  Eome, 
and  Egypt,  the  worship  of  ancestors  and  reverence  for 
founders  of  tribes  remained  alongside  the  worship  of  the 
gods— the  latter  remaining  at  the  head  of  what  came  to  be 
a  family,  consisting  of  gods,  half-gods,  and  heroes,  so  that 
the  inferior  gods  really  came  to  receive  the  greater  homage 
from  the  mass  of  the  people — this  development  never  took 
place  in  Israel.  They  have  no  mythology,  and  the  reason  is 
that  Jahaveh  did  not  admit  the  worship  either  of  ances- 
tors or  of  heavenly  bodies  along  with  His  own.  His  wor- 
ship is  directly  opposed  to  such,  and  so  gradually  elimin- 
ated it.  And  we  have  neither  the  slightest  trace  in  Israel 
of  Jahaveh  being  regarded  as  a  primus  inter  pares,  nor  of 
His  having  a  consort  as  Baal  had  in  Astarte. 

This  distinguishing  feature  of  the  Jahaveh  religion, 
Stade  concludes,  cannot  be  traced  to  any  peculiarity  in 
the  Semitic  race,  for  other  members  of  the  Semitic  family 
exhibit  polytheism  exactly  like  that  of  Greece.  It  can 
only  be  explained  on  the  supposition  that  from  tlie 
moment  Israel  received  the  Jahaveh  religion  His  char- 
acter was  differently  apprehended  from  that  of  tlie  poly- 
theistic gods.  But  when  we  expect  him  to  tell  us  what 
the  element  in  Jahaveh's  character  was  which  thus  dis- 
tinguished Him,  this  is  what  he  tells  us :  The  dis- 
tinguishing thought  which  made  this  religion  of  Jaha- 
veh different  from  these  can  only  have  been  that  Jahaveh 
was  the  only  God  of  Israel,  and  therefore  His  worship 
excluded  that  of  all  other  gods.  Had  not  this  idea  been 
firmly  held  from  the  beginning,  considering  the  tempta- 
tions that  lay  on  every  side,  from  the  time  the  tribes 
entered  Canaan,  to  polytheistic  views,  the  result  could  not 

1  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  438  f. 


300  Ethic  Monotheism. 

have  been  the  view  of  Jahaveh's  unity  that  came  to  prevail. 
It  goes  back  for  initiation  to  the  founder  of  the  religion. 
This  much  is  due  to  the  work  and  the  thought  of  Moses.^ 

These  statements  of  Stade  deserve  to  be  well  weiojhed. 
They  suggest  two  questions : — 

(1.)  Are  the  points  which  he  marks  out  as  distinctive  of 
the  Jahaveh  religion  actual  points  of  diflerence  from  other 
Semitic  religions  as  these  are  understood  by  himself  ?  He 
and  other  writers  of  his  school  are  never  tired  of  telling 
us  that  Jahaveli  was  the  God  of  Israel  or  of  Canaan,  just 
as  Chemosh  was  the  god  of  Moab.  And  Kuenen  says 
plainly  ^  that  though  Jahaveh  was  believed  by  Israel  to 
be  mightier  than  the  gods  of  other  nations,  there  was 
nothing  in  this  to  distinguish  the  Israelite  religion,  for 
this  was  the  belief  of  the  Moabite  with  regard  to  Camosli 
(Chemosh),  and  of  the  Ammonite  with  regard  to  Malcam 
(Moloch).  As  to  the  national  god  being  able  to  follow  his 
worshipper  and  defend  him  in  a  strange  land,  the  inscrip- 
tion of  Salmsezab,  referred  to  by  Kenan,  is  urged  in  proof 
that  this  was  a  common  belief.  As  to  its  being  a  distinc- 
tion that  Jahaveh  was  at  the  first  declared  to  be  the  sole 
deity  to  be  reverenced  in  Israel,  the  neighbouring  nations 
also  had  each  their  national  and  exclusive  god.  If  Stade 
should  reply  that  these  nations  admitted  the  recognition 
and  worship  of  other  gods  alongside  their  national  god, 
why,  this  is  the  very  thing  that  he  and  his  school  say  the 
Israelites  all  did  up  to  the  time  of  the  prophets.  It  is 
they  also  who  point  to  the  obscure  passage  in  the  book 
of  Kings  to  prove  that  the  god  of  the  Moabites  was  stirred 
up  by  the  horrible  sacrifice  of  the  king's  first-born  to  de- 
fend his  own  people ;  so  that  the  jealousy  of  one  national 
god   against   another,  which  Stade   makes   a   distinctive 

1  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  p.  439.  ^  National  Religions,  p.  118. 


Initial  Distinctiveness  of  Character.  301 

mark  of  the  Jabaveh  religion,  is,  on  his  own  principle,  a 
common  belief. 

(2.)  If  these  points  are  really  distinctive  of  the  Jabaveh 
religion  in  any  significant  sense,  then  what  becomes  of 
the  whole  position  of  Stade  and  his  school,  that  the 
Jabaveh  religion  was  at  first  a  mere  nature-worship  ?  On 
this  ground  it  is  not  a  question  of  showing  how  pre- 
prophetic  Jahavism  was  purified  and  exalted  by  the 
prophets;  it  is  a  question  of  explaining  this  initial  dis- 
tinctiveness which  runs  back  to  Mosaic  times.  How 
can  Stade  explain  the  manner  in  which  a  mere  nature- 
god  was  adopted  by  Israel,  and  made  from  the  beginning 
the  sole  object  of  worship  ?  When  he  says  that  the 
character  of  Jabaveh  was  from  the  first  differently  appre- 
hended from  that  of  the  heathen  gods,  this  is  just  what 
the  Biblical  writers  say.  But  when  he  goes  on  to  say 
that  the  distinguishing  thing  was  that  this  God  alone  was 
to  be  Israel's  God,  he  is  giving  no  adequate  explanation. 
The  question  is.  Why  was  Jabaveh  regarded  as  Israel's 
God  to  the  exclusion  of  all  others  ?  and  Stade  answers. 
Because  from  the  first  He  was  so  regarded.  Surely  it 
was  something  in  His  character,  something  that  He  did 
or  was  believed  to  have  done,  that  gave  Him  this  pre- 
eminence. But  Stade,  held  fast  in  his  naturalistic  theory, 
cannot  admit  this,  and  so  lands  himself  in  helpless  con- 
fusion. The  distinctive  elements  of  the  Jabaveh  religion, 
as  he  puts  them,  are  not  distinctive  at  all ;  or  if  they 
are,  they  are  distinctive  in  a  much  higher  sense  than  he 
ascribes  to  them. 

II.  The  modern  theory,  it  seems  to  me,  thus  breaks  down 
utterly  at  this  the  initial  point;  and  I  do  not  think  it 
can  establish  itself  any  more  successfully  in  explaining 
the  development  at  the  other  end — i.e.,  in  accounting  for 


302  Ethic  Monotheism. 

the  alleged  transition  from  belief  in  a  merely  national 
god  to  the  "ethic  monotheism/'  as  it  is  called,  of  the 
prophets.  On  this  subject  writers  of  the  modern  critical 
school  1  draw  an  intelligible  distinction  between  monol- 
atry  and  monotheism — i.e.,  the  worship  of  one  God,  and 
the  belief  that  there  is  only  one  God.^  The  ancient 
Israelites,  says  Stade,  were  theoretically  polytheists,  but 
practically  monotheists:  they  believed  in  the  existence 
of  Chemosh,  the  god  of  Moab ;  of  Milkom  (Moloch),  the 
god  of  the  Ammonites ;  and  Baalzebub,  the  god  of  the 
Ekronites,  and  others,  just  as  they  believed  in  the  exist- 
ence of  Jahaveh,  their  own  God.  The  distinction  which 
they  drew  was  not  between  God  and  idols,  or  between  God 
and  no-gods,  but  between  Jahaveh  and  the  "  gods  of  the 
nations."  This  explains  the  expression  "  the  God  of  the 
Hebrews"  (Exod.  iii.  18,  &c.),  and  the  other  expression, 
"  Jahaveh  the  God  of  Israel "  (Judges  xi.  21,  &c.),  and  even 
the  mode  of  speaking  of  the  God  of  Abraham,  Isaac,  and 
Jacob.  The  idea  of  a  universe,  he  says,  was  beyond  the 
comprehension  of  a  people  who  knew  only  the  countries 
round  about  Canaan;  and  the  passages  that  represent 
God  as  the  Creator  of  all  things  are  the  product  of  later 
times.  Such  passages  as  Amos  v.  8,  9,  which  are  from  an 
early  book,  are  inconvenient  for  this  theory,  and  accord- 
ingly are  set  aside  as  disturbing  the  progress  of  the  dis- 
course, and  probably  not  genuine.*    But  this  is  a  trifle. 

The  argument  at  first  sight  seems  forcible,  but  on 
examination  it  will  be  found  not  to  sustain  the  position 
which  it  is  used  to  support.  No  doubt  the  Biblical  writers 
continually  speak  of  the  gods  of  the  nations  by  name,  as 
if  they  believed  in  their   existence   and  operation.     So 

1  stade,  Geschichte,  vol.  i.  pp.  428  fif.,  507.  ^  g^e  Note  XXI. 

3  Kuenen,  National  Relig.,  p.  113.     Comp.  above,  chap.  vi.  p.  146. 


The  First  Commandment,  303 

does  Milton  in  his  '  Paradise  Lost.'  The  passage  (Judges 
xi.  24)  in  wliich  Jephthah  says  to  Moab,  "Wilt  not 
thou  possess  that  which  Chemosh  thy  god  giveth  thee 
to  possess  ? "  seems  to  be  quite  decisive  on  this  point ; 
and  so  it  has  been  referred  to  constantly  from  Vatke^ 
to  Wellhausen  2  to  prove  that  originally  "  Israel  is  a 
people  just  like  other  people,  nor  is  even  his  relation- 
ship to  Jehovah  otherwise  conceived  of  than  is,  for  ex- 
ample, that  of  Moab  to  Chemosh."  But,  as  Dr  Davidson 
has  pointed  out,^  Wellhausen  invalidates  his  own  argu- 
ment when  in  another  place*  he  makes  this  whole  pas- 
sage an  interpolation  based  on  Numbers  xxi.  29,  which 
would  bring  it  well  down  in  the  age  of  the  canonical 
prophets.  Indeed,  as  Davidson  points  out,  there  is  a 
passage  of  Jeremiah  (xlviii.  7)  which  would  prove  that 
even  he  believed  in  the  godhead  of  Chemosh, — a  proof 
that  such  a  mode  of  reasoning  has  no  force. 

So,  too,  the  language  of  the  Decalogue,  "Thou  shalt 
have  no  other  gods  before  me,"  may  seem  at  first  sight  to 
imply  that  the  existence  of  other  gods  was  taken  for  granted, 
only  that  Jahaveh  alone  was  to  be  worshipped  by  Israel. 
On  this  I  cannot  do  better  than  quote  the  thoughtful  words 
of  Dr  Davidson : — 

"  To  our  minds  such  a  statement  as  this,  that  Israel  shall  have  no 
God  but  Jehovah,  immediately  suggests  tlie  inquiry,  whether  there 
be  any  other  god  but  Him.  But  such  questions  might  not  present 
themselves  to  minds  of  a  different  cast  from  ours  and  in  early  times, 
for  our  minds  are  quickened  by  all  the  speculations  about  God  which 
have  filled  the  centuries  from  the  days  of  Moses  to  our  own.  We 
may  not  have  evidence  that  the  mind  of  Israel  in  the  earliest  time 
put  these  general  and  abstract  questions  to  itself.     But  we  are  cer- 


1  Bibl.  TheoL,  p.  258.  2  jjig^.  of  Israel,  p.  235. 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  49. 

■*  See  Bleak's  Einleitung,  4te  Aufl.,  p.  195. 


304  Ethic  Mo7iot7ieism. 

tainly  entirely  preclmled  from  inferring  from  the  form  of  the  first 
commandment  that  the  existence  of  other  gods  was  admitted,  only 
that  Israel  should  have  none  of  them.  For  if  we  consider  the  moral 
element  of  the  Code,  we  find  the  commandments  all  taking  the  same 
negative  form  ;  but  who  will  argue  that  when  Moses  said  to  Israel, 
Thou  shalt  not  kill,  he  made  murder  unlawful  merely  in  Israel, 
without  feeling  that  it  was  unlawful  wherever  men  existed  ? "  ^ 

The  truth  is,  we  have  here  to  do  with  an  instance  of 
the  imperfection  of  language  and  the  freaks  the  human 
mind  plays  in  the  use  of  names.  How  was  an  Israelite  to 
speak  of  the  heathen  gods  unless  by  using  their  names  ? 
And  as  soon  as  we  give  a  thing  a  name,  it  has  a  certain 
existence  for  us.  St  Paul  tells  us  how  hard  it  was  for 
Christians  in  his  day,  accustomed  to  the  names  of  heathen 
gods,  to  grasp  the  fact  that  "an  idol  is  nothing  in  the 
world ; "  ^  and  even  at  the  present  day,  I  doubt  very  much 
whether  the  majority  of  people  who  speak  of  Jupiter  and 
Apollo  consciously  carry  in  their  minds  the  conviction 
that  these  are  mere  names  of  what  never  had  existence.^ 
The  early  preachers  of  Christianity  in  pagan  countries 
had  the  utmost  dijSiculty  in  rooting  out  the  belief  in 
heathen  gods.  So  long  as  the  names  lingered,  the  unso- 
phisticated mind  assigned  to  the  numen  an  actual  exist- 
ence; and  hence,  perhaps,  we  may  explain  how  the  mis- 
sionaries and  their  converts  turned  these  pagan  objects  of 
worship  into  demons  or  evil  spirits.  We  need  not  wonder, 
in  the  face  of  this  psychological  phenomenon,  if  the  simple- 
minded  Hebrews  use  language  that  may  be  drawn  into  a 

1  Expositor,  I.e.,  p.  44.  ^  1  Cor.  viii.  4-7. 

^  Au  amusing  instance  of  the  facility  with  which  the  name  takes  the 
place  of  the  thing  is  furnished  by  Voltaire.  In  the  Latin  Bible  the  witch 
of  Endor  is  called  Pythonissa  (in  the  LXX.  EyyaaTpifMuOos) ;  and  Voltaire 
argued  that  since  the  name  Python  could  not  have  been  known  to  the 
Hebrews  in  the  days  of  Saul,  this  history  cannot  have  been  earlier  than 
the  time  of  Alexander,  when  the  Greeks  traded  with  the  Hebrews.  One 
wonders  how  mauy  of  Voltaire's  readers  perceived  his  mistake. 


Elijah's  Mockery  of  Baal.  305 

wrong  sense.  If  they  asked  themselves  at  all  what  they 
meant  by  such  language,  the  common  people  would  be 
perhaps  as  perplexed  as,  e.g.,  an  ordinary  person  would  be 
if  asked  to  explain  what  Allah,  or  Moloch,  or  Asshur  is  in 
his  mind.  The  modern  Jew  would  not  admit  that  his 
nation's  God  is  the  Allah  of  the  Mohammedan;  but  are 
we  to  say  that  the  Jew  is  not  yet  a  monotheist?^  I 
believe  it  may  safely  be  asserted  that  there  is  not  a 
single  passage  in  the  Old  Testament  which  can  be  taken 
to  prove  that  the  leaders  of  religious  thought — prophets 
and  prophetic  men— ever  regarded  Jahaveh  as  on  a  level 
with  the  gods  of  the  nations,  as  no  more  to  Israel,  no 
more  in  the  world,  than  Chemosh  or  Milcom  or  Baal  to 
their  worshippers.  Nay,  there  is  one  passage,  in  an  early 
writing  too,  which  ought  to  be  decisive  of  this  matter. 
Elijah,  on  Carmel,  is  represented  as  using  language  in 
regard  to  the  Phoenician  Baal  (1  Kings  xviii.  27)  which, 
if  it  is  taken  as  a  mockery  of  the  conceptions  of  the  Baal- 
worshippers,  is  in  striking  contrast  with  even  the  boldest 
anthropomorphisms  applied  by  Israelites  to  their  God,  and, 
in  any  case,  shows  that  this  prophet  had  got  very  nearly 
to,  if  he  had  not  actually  apprehended,  the  truth  that  "  an 
idol  is  nothing  in  the  world."  This  may  not  be  mono- 
theism in  an  abstract  pliilosophical  sense  —  for  religion 
was  to  Israel  not  a  product  of  thought  but  an  instinct 
— yet  it  is  infinitely  more  than  the  bare  monolatry  of 
which  modern  writers  speak. 

We  come  now  to  consider  the  arguments  by  which  it  is 
sought  to  be  proved  how,  from  a  circumscribed  national 
monolatry,  in  which  Jahaveh  was  regarded  as  the  only 
God  of  Israel,  there  was  reached  the  "ethic  monotheism  " 

^  Do  not  we  continue  to  speak  of  the  God  of  the  Christian,  although  we 
believe  that  there  is  none  other  ?  ' 


306  "      Ethic  Monotheism. 

of  the  prophets,  in  which  He  is  viewed  as  the  God  of  the 
whole  earth,  the  only  God.  Here  we  take  for  our  guide 
Kuenen,  who  has  devoted  a  special  work  ^  to  the  subject. 

In  the  popular  conception,  says  Kuenen  (p.  118),  Jalia- 
veh  was  a  great  and  mighty  God,  mightier  than  the  gods 
of  other  nations.  And  this  popular  conception  was  stimu- 
lated and  supported  by  political  events.  "  When  David 
waged  the  wars  of  Yahweh  with  a  strong  hand  (1  Sam. 
xviii.  17 ;  xxv.  28),  and  when  victory  crowned  his  arms, 
he  made  Yahweh  Himself  rise  in  the  popular  estimation, 
Solomon's  glory  shone  upon  the  deity  to  whom  he  had 
consecrated  the  temple  in  his  capital."  In  this  popular 
conception  of  their  national  deity,  the  attribute  oi  might 
was  the  principal  element.  The  people  no  doubt  ascribed 
to  their  God  moral  attributes  (as  is  proved  by  the 
priestly  Torah),  but  these  were  only  some  among  many 
of  His  attributes,  and  in  the  popular  conception  the  stage 
of  an  ethical  character  had  not  been  reached  (p.  115). 
Jahaveh  as  a  very  mighty  One,  and  Jahaveh  inseparably 
bound  to  Israel  His  people,  these  were  the  fundamental 
ideas  of  the  popular  religion.  In  proof  of  this,  Kuenen 
appeals  to  the  historical  books  of  *'  the  Old  Testament — 
whose  authors  certainly  stood  higher  in  this  respect  than 
the  great  masses."  In  these  books  "  the  idea  comes  into 
the  foreground  more  than  once,  that  Jahaveh  had  to  up- 
hold His  own  honour,  and  therefore  could  not  neglect  to 
protect  and  bless  His  people.  Thus,  in  the  conception  of 
the  people,  Yahweh's  might,  or,  if  you  prefer  to  put  it  so, 
Yahweh's  obligation  to  display  His  might,  must  often  have 
overbalanced  both  His  wrath  against  Israel's  trespasses 
and  che  demands  of  His  righteousness"  (p.  115  f.) 

With  this  popular  view  the  prophets   so  far  agreed. 

^  Hibbert  Lecture  for  1882,  National  Religions  and  Universal  Religions. 


Agreement  of  Popular  and  Prophetic  Ideas,        307 

although  on  essential  points  they  differed  from  it.  As 
to  the  agreement,  I  quote  Kuenen's  words  (p.  105):^ 
"  Yahweh  Israel's  God,  and  Israel  Yahweh's  people !  It 
surely  needs  no  proof  that  the  canonical  prophets  en- 
dorse this  fundamental  conception  of  the  popular  reli- 
gion, that  not  one  of  them  ever  thinks  of  denying  it. 
The  whole  of  their  preaching  takes  this  as  its  starting- 
point,  and  leads  back  to  it  as  its  goal.  On  this  latter 
point  I  wish  to  place  the  utmost  emphasis."  He  then 
goes  on  to  show  that  though  the  prophets  looked 
forward  to  the  extinction  of  the  national  life  of  Israel, 
and  the  captivity  of  the  people  into  a  strange  land,  yet 
in  their  mind  tliis  was  to  be  followed,  sooner  or  later,  by 
a  restoration.  This  is  indeed  to  be  accompanied  by  a 
transformation  in  the  people  themselves.  *'  But  however 
great  the  change  may  be — though  the  wolf  lie  down  with 
the  lamb  and  the  suckiug  child  play  by  tlie  adder's  hole ; 
nay,  though  there  be  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth,  yet 
the  relation  between  Jahaveh  and  Israel  remains  the 
same"  (p.  106  f.)  So  that  the  canonical  prophets  of  the 
eighth  and  succeeding  centuries  are  not  only  the  legiti- 
mate successors  of  Elijah  and  Elisha,  but  it  would  be 
a  contradicting  of  these  prophets  themselves  were  we 
to  begin  by  loosening  the  tie  that  unites  them  to  the 
Israelite  nation. 

"  We  are  indeed  doing  the  prophets  ill  service  if  we  conceal  the 
fundamental  thought  of  all  their  preaching.  In  tliis  respect,  Iliacos 
intra  muros  iieccatur  et  extra.  Eationalists  have  branded  as  *  par- 
ticularism,' and  supranaturalists  have  done  their  best  to  explain 
away  or  evaporate,  what  is  really  nothing  less  than  the  very  essence 
of  the  Israelitish  religion,  to  which  even  the  greatest  prophets  could 
not  be  untrue  without  sacrificing  that  religion  itself"  (p.  109  f.) 


*  See  also  Kuenen's  Religion  of  Israel  (Eng.  trans.),  vol.  i.  p.  219 


308  Ethic  Monotheism. 

And  now,  having  seen  to  what  extent  the  prophets 
agreed  with  the  popular  religious  conceptions  of  their 
time,  we  have  to  consider  in  what  respects,  according  to 
Kuenen,  they  differed  from  them.  For  there  is  no  doubt 
that  in  essential  points  they  stood  opposed  to  the  religious 
opinions  of  their  day,  and  held  views  that  brought  them 
into  sharp  antagonism  with  not  only  the  common  people, 
but  even  the  official  heads  of  the  nation.  "  The  prophets," 
says  Kuenen  (p.  73),  "  while  admitting  the  national  wor- 
ship of  Jahaveh  as  a  fact,  nevertheless  condemn  it  from 
time  to  time  in  the  strongest  terms.  It  answers  in  no 
degree  to  their  ideal." 

"The  images  of  Yaliweh  which  adorned  most  of  the  bamoth  as 
well  as  the  temples  at  Dan  and  Beth-el,  imply  that  the  ideas  men 
had  of  Him  were  crude  and  material  in  the  extreme.  Of  the  re- 
ligious solemnities  we  know  little,  but  enough  to  assert  with  con- 
fidence that  they  embodied  anything  but  spiritual  conceptions. 
Wanton  licence  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  terror-stricken  attempt 
to  propitiate  the  deity  with  human  sacrifices  on  the  other,  were  the 
two  extremes  into  which  the  worshippers  of  Yahweh  appear  by  no 
means  exceptionally  to  have  fallen.  No  one  will  undertake  to 
defend  all  this,  especially  as  at  that  very  time  there  was  already 
another  and  a  higher  standard  in  ancient  Israel  opposed  to  the 
lower,  and  judging  it"  (p.  75  f.) 

What  then  was  this  "  ideal,"  this  "  higher  standard,"  in 
ancient  Israel  which  the  prophets  had  got  hold  of  ?  The 
true  prophet,  we  are  told  (p.  112),  was,  as  Jeremiah 
characterises  him  (Jer.  xxviii.  8,  9),  a  prophet  of  evil. 
And  why  ?  Because  he  was  "  the  preacher  of  repentance, 
the  representative  of  Yahweh's  strict  moral  demands 
amongst  a  people  that  but  too  ill  conforms  to  them." 
That  is  to  say,  holiness  is  now  no  longer  one  attribute 
among  many  others,  as  it  was  in  the  popular  conception : 
"in  the  consciousness  of  the  prophets,  the  central  place 


Difference  between  Popular  and  Prophetic  Ideas.     309 

was  taken,  not  by  the  might  but  by  the  holiness  of 
Yahweh.  Thereby  the  conception  of  God  was  carried  up 
into  another  and  a  higher  sphere  (p.  119)."  And  "  as 
soon  as  an  ethical  character  [as  distinguished  from  merely 
a  moral  attribute  among  others]  was  ascribed  to  Yahweh, 
He  must  act  in  accordance  with  it.  The  Holy  One,  the 
Eighteous  One,  might  renounce  His  people,  but  He  could 
not  renounce  Himself "  (p.  115  f.) 

"  This  profoundly  ethical  conception  of  Yahweh's  being," 
Kuenen  proceeds  to  reason  (p.  114),  "could  not  fail  to 
bring  the  prophets  into  conflict  with  the  religious  con- 
victions of  their  people."  For  whereas  the  latter  had 
emphasised  the  attribute  of  might,  and  relied  upon  the 
fact  that  Yahweh  and  Israel  were  inseparable,  so  that  He 
was  bound  to  help  them,  even  at  the  expense  of  His 
holiness,  the  prophets  put  it  differently  —  that,  being 
above  all  things  holy.  He  was  bound  to  assert  His 
holiness  even  at  the  expense  of  His  people.  Thus,  when 
the  people,  as  troubles  gathered  on  the  political  horizon, 
thought  they  could  appease  their  God  and  secure  His 
favour  by  more  numerous  and  costly  sacrifices  and  mul- 
tiplied vows  (p.  115),  reckoning  with  certainty  (Micah 
iii.  11)  upon  the  help  of  the  God  who  was  in  their 
midst,  or  when  in  straits  they  cast  about  for  new  help, 
lavishing  even  sacrifices  of  their  own  children  (p.  122),  the 
prophets  denounced  such  confidence  as  vain,  and  saw  in 
the  very  troubles  that  came  upon  the  nation  the  righteous 
hand  of  Yahweh  Himself,  asserting  not  only  His  might, 
but  pre-eminently  His  holiness  against  an  ungodly  nation. 
Thus  the  two  modes  of  viewing  political  events  and 
national  experience  were  diametrically  opposed.  The 
one,  the  popular  view,  based  its  faith  on  earthly  prosperity 
and  success.    "  But,"  says  Kuenen  (p.  118  f.),  "  it  lies  in  the 


310  Ethic  Monotheism,        __    x-     \ 

nature  of  the  case  that  a  faith  reared  upon  such  foun- 
dations was  subject  to  many  shocks,  and  under  given 
circumstances  might  easily  collapse.  Born  of  the  sense  of 
national  dignity,  growing  with  its  growth  and  strengthen- 
m^  with  its  strenofth,  it  must  likewise  suffer  under  the 
blows  that  fell  upon  it,  must  pine  and  ultimately  die 
when,  with  the  independence  of  the  nation,  national 
self-consciousness  disappeared."  The  other,  the  prophetic 
view,  making  Yahweh's  holiness  His  central  attribute,  and 
ascribing  to  Him  an  ethical  character,  was  not  dependent 
ou  the  fluctuations  of  political  events.  "When  others," 
says  Wellhausen,  "  saw  only  the  ruin  of  everything  that 
is  holiest,  they  saw  the  triumph  of  Jehovah  over  delusion 
and  error;"  to  which  Kuenen  adds  (p.  124): — 

"What  was  Ihus  revealed  to  tlieir  spirit  was  no  less  than  the 
august  idea  of  the  moral  (jovernment  of  the  world — crude  as  yet,  and 
with  manifold  admixture  of  error,  but  pure  in  principle.  The 
prophets  had  no  conception  of  the  mutual  connection  of  the  powers 
and  operations  of  nature.  They  never  dreamed  of  the  possibility 
of  carrying  them  back  to  a  single  cause  or  deducing  them  from  it. 
r>at  what  they  did  see,  on  the  field  within  their  view,  was  the 
icalisalion  of  a  single  plan — everything,  not  only  the  tumult  of  the 
peoples,  but  all  nature  likewise,  subservient  to  the  working  out  of 
one  great  purpose.  The  name  "ethical  monotheism"  describes 
better  than  any  other  the  characteristics  of  their  point  of  view,  for 
it  not  only  expresses  the  character  of  the  one  God  whom  they 
worshipped,  but  also  indicates  the  fountain  whence  their  faith  in 
Ilim  welled  up." 

Thus  then,  though  the  prophets  were  regarded  by  their 
contemporaries  as  speaking  nothing  less  than  blasphemy 
(p.  117)  when  they  declared  that  Jerusalem  should  be 
destroyed  and  its  people  carried  into  captivity,  and 
though  in  effect  they  were  the  destroyers  of  the  old  national 
religion,'  yet  they  were  led  by  the  contemplation  of  political 


Foundation  for  Universal  Religion.  311 

events,  and  by  the  working  out  of  their  own  ethical 
conceptions,  to  lay  the  foundations  of  a  religion  of  world- 
wide application  and  significance.  They  still  held  to  the 
inseparability  of  Jahaveh  and  Israel ;  but  in  their  glowing 
descriptions  of  the  blessings  of  the  coming  age,  they 
represented  Israel  as  no  longer  the  special  object  of  God's 
care  and  recipient  of  His  favours,  but  as  the  organ  and 
instrument  of  blessings  to  the  whole  world.  Thus 
anticipations  which,  in  the  popular  conception,  were 
limited,  became  transformed.  "  Many  of  the  descriptions 
of  Israel's  restoration,  and  of  the  role  which  the  heathen 
will  take  therein,  have  none  but  literary  and  aesthetic 
claims  on  our  admiration "  (p.  126) ;  whereas,  on  the 
other  hand,  it  lay  in  the  nature  of  the  case  that  ethical 
monotheism,  even  in  the  period  of  its  genesis,  must  give 
a  fresh  turn  to  expectations  with  regard  to  Yahweh 
and  the  peoples.  In  its  full  development,  of  course, 
this  idea  of  universalism  took  its  highest  flight  of  all, 
as  is  seen  most  conspicuously  in  the  exalted  ideas 
and  comprehensive  views  of  the  prophets  which  cul- 
minate in  the  glowing  anticipations  of  the  second  Isaiah 
(p.  128). 

There  is  much  truth  and  much  suggestiveness  in  what 
Kuenen  here  puts  forward.  What  he  says  throws  much 
light  both  on  the  relation  of  the  prophets  to  the  "  popular 
religion,"  and  also  on  the  gradual  progress  in  the  con- 
ceptions of  the  prophets  themselves.  In  speaking  of  the 
"popular  religion,"  we  must,  with  Kuenen,  admit  that 
"  all  sincere  religion  is  true  religion,  and  must  secure  its 
beneficent  result;"  that  "not  in  vain  did  men  thank 
Yahweh  for  the  blessing  of  liarvest,  perform  their  work 
with  eyes  fixed  upon  Him,  trust  in  His  help  under  afflic- 
tions, and  turn  to  Him  for  succour  in   times  of   peril" 


312  Ethic  Monotheism. 

(p.  76).  And  in  regard  to  the  prophetic  religion,  wo 
frankly  admit  that  the  course  of  political  events  taught 
the  propiiets  much,  and  that  through  outward  events  and 
tlie  germination  of  the  inner  conception  which  tliey  en- 
tertained, tliey  reached  purer  and  more  comprehensive 
views  as  time  went  on.  But  all  this  does  not  reach  the 
point  we  wisli  to  attain.  What  we  wish  to  know  is  the 
best  and  highest  tliat  any  in  the  nation  had  reached  at 
tlie  earliest  times  at  which  we  can  catch  a  view  of  the 
Jahaveh  religion,  and  how  much  of  that  survived  as  a 
national  inheritance.  We  wish  to  know  wliether  the 
popular  religion  and  the  prophetic  had  not  a  common 
starting-point,  one  source  from  which  they  sprang  and 
ihen  separated ;  we  want  to  know  whether  this  prophetic 
ideal  is  not  derived  from  tlie  pre-prophetic  times ;  and  if 
it  is  not,  we  wisli  a  definite  explanation  of  its  origin  and 
its  development  out  of  the  lower  conceptions  to  which  it 
stood  opposed.  And  this  I  think  Kuenen  with  all  his 
ingenuity  has  not  furnished. 

1.  In  the  first  place,  when  Kuenen  sets  down  as  the 
very  essence  of  the  Israelitish  religion  the  fundamental 
article  on  wliich  people  and  prophets  agreed,  Yahwch 
Israel's  God,  and  Israel  Yahiceh's  'people ,  he  only  states  in 
his  own  way  what  tlie  Biblical  writers  one  and  all  insist 
on,  and  what  the "  Hebrew  historians  represent  in  various 
fashions  as  an  election  or  clioico  of  Israel  by  Jahaveh,  or 
a  covenant  relation  between  tlie  two.  It  is  but  just  to 
Kuenen  to  draw  attention  to  the  fact  that  he  ascribes  to 
Moses  this  amount  at  least  of  influence  on  Israel,  in 
saying  that  "  the  consciousness  that  a  peculiar  and  inti- 
mate relation  existed  between  the  God  in  whose  name 
Moses  came  forward  and  the  tribes  of  Israel,  never  died 
out." .  He  would  not  call  this  a  covenant  in  the  Biblical 


The  Covenant,  313 

sense/  and  he  insists  that  the  conviction  went  no  further 
than  this  brief  acknowledgment,  since  Moses  failed  in 
impressing  on  the  people  his  own  ideas  of  God's  moral 
nature.  "  In  one  word,"  he  says,  "  whatever  distinguished 
Moses  from  his  nation  remained  his  personal  possession 
and  that  of  a  few  kindred  spirits.  .  .  .  Under  Moses' 
influence  Israel  took  a  step  forward,  but  it  was  only  one 
step."  ^  In  view,  however,  of  Kuenen's  clear  recognition  of 
the  one  fundamental  piece  of  common  ground  occupied  by 
prophets  and  people,  we  are  entitled  to  ask  him  what  was 
the  common  conviction  from  which  both  started,  seeing 
that  both  in  their  respective  modes  held  so  tenaciously 
Lo  it.  There  must  have  been  some  objective  fact  in  the 
history  that  gave  a  start  to  tliis  common  conception,  or 
some  point  of  time  at  which  this  relationship  was  pressed 
home  on  the  consciousness  of  the  nation,  to  give  it  this 
firm,  incontrovertible  position  with  people  and  prophet 
alike.  And  if  the  conception  is  synchronous  with  the 
adoption  of  the  Jahaveh  religion — if,  that  is  to  say,  as 
Stade  has  concluded,  from  the  moment  that  Jahaveh  was 
accepted  as  the  God  of  Israel,  the  impression  that  He  and 
none  but  He  was  to  be  their  god — then  we  go  back  to  the 
time  of  Moses  for  the  common  fountain  of  this  conviction. 
That  is  to  say,  at  a  historical  time  and  under  some  his- 
torical conditions,  the  whole  nation  became  possessed  of 
the  idea  that  Jahaveh  and  His  people  were  inseparably 

^  Smend  (Moses  apud  Prophetas,  p.  19)  says  distinct]y,  "  That  a  cove- 
nant was  once  on  Mount  Sinai  concluded  by  Moses,  is  affirmed  from  of  old 
by  the  most  certain  and  unanimous  tradition."  Wellhausen,  however, 
perceiving  that  the  admission  of  a  covenant  entered  into  under  definite 
historical  conditions  would  shatter  his  system,  says  that  the  word  for  a 
covenant  between  Jehovah  and  His  people  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  older 
prophets  (Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  417  f.)     See  Note  XXII.     Cf.  below,  p.  338. 

2  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  294. 


314  Ethic  Monotlicism-. 

joined  to  one  another.  And  then  the  question  arises, 
"What  were  those  historical  conditions  ?  and  which  of  tlie 
two  shall  we  take  as  the  better  interpreters  of  what  that 
relation  was — the  mass  of  the  unthinking  and  careless 
people,  or  the  dite  of  the  nation's  religious  men  ?  Surely 
an  idea  held  so  tenaciously  by  all  classes  in  common  must 
rest  upon  something  more  definite  and  positive  than  the 
mere  choice  by  a  nation,  or  by  their  leader  for  them,  of 
some  "  Thunderer."  Kuenen  himself  is  obliged  to  admit 
that,  even  in  the  popular  conception,  the  idea  of  holiness 
was  present  from  the  very  first,  though  not  as  a  central 
attribute.  If,  then,  the  conception  of  holiness  was  there 
from  the  first,  are  not  the  prophets  more  likely  tlian  the 
common  people  to  have  preserved,  to  have  inherited  from 
the  best  of  their  predecessors,  from  their  spiritual  teachers, 
tlie  place  of  that  attribute  in  Jahaveh's  character  ?  The 
attribute  of  might  never  disappeared  from  the  conception 
which  the  prophets  had,  nor  can  a  time  be  pointed  to 
when  the  attribute  of  might  existed  apart  from  that  of 
holiness.  Since  Kuenen  and  his  school  feel  themselves 
constrained  to  postulate  a  moral  attribute  from  the  very 
first,  it  is  much  more  reasonable  to  believe  that  the  think- 
ing and  more  religious  part  of  the  nation  would  assign 
to  the  moral  a  higher  and  more  central  place  than  to 
the  physical.  In  brief,  the  character  of  Jahaveh  was 
moral  in  its  initial  conception. 

2.  In  the  second  place,  I  think  his  reasoning  is  quite 
insufficient  to  show  that  mere  political  events  produced 
either  the  popular  or  the  prophetic  conceptions.  No 
doubt  these  nourished  the  one  idea  or  the  other,  or 
stimulated  it  to  greater  developments;  but  something 
deeper,  in  the  one  case  and  the  other,  must  be  assumed, 
before    we    can    understand    either    set    of    phenomena. 


Influence  of  Political  E cents,  315 

Tlie  popular  idea,  he  says,  was  stimulated  and  supported 
by  political  events,  so  that  David's  wars  and  Solo- 
mon's magnificence  reflected  a  glory  upon  the  national 
God  in  the  popular  estimation ;  ^  and  that  is  no  doubt 
true  in  a  sense.  But  it  is  not  so  easy  to  follow  him 
when  he  goes  on  to  say  that  the  popular  conception, 
born  of  the  sense  of  national  dignity,  was  bound  to 
suffer  under  the  blows  that  fell  upon  it,  and  ultimately 
to  die,  when,  with  the  independence  of  the  nation,  na- 
tional self-consciousness  disappeared  (p.  119).  We  are 
confronted  by  historical  facts  that  are  irreconcilable 
with  this  sweeping  assertion.  If  the  popular  conception 
was  "  born  of  the  sense  of  national  dignity,"  and  had  no 
firmer  foundation,  it  would  have  disappeared  long  before 
the  time  of  the  Assyrian  invasions.  There  were  times  in 
the  nation's  history  when  the  national  fortunes  were  at 
the  very  lowest  point,  such  as  the  times  succeeding 
Joshua,  and  the  period  immediately  preceding  the  ap- 
pearance of  Samuel.  If  outward  reverse  had  been  able 
to  break  up  the  feeling  of  national  consciousness,  it  was 
at  such  times  that  the  thing  would  have  happened.  But 
it  did  not ;  and  in  fact  it  is  just  at  times  of  deepest  de- 
pression that  the  religious  life  of  Israel  makes  new  depar- 
tures. Wellhausen,  e.g.,  places  the  rise  of  Nabiism  in  the 
time  when  Israel  was  held  down  hardest  by  the  Philis- 
tines. On  Kuenen's  own  principles,  therefore,  we  are 
bound  to  assume  that  (since  a  faith  born  of  mere 
national  dignity  cannot  stand  such  shocks)  the  popular 
faith  had  something  else  to  sustain  it.  The  popular  faith 
must  at  these  earlier  times  have  had  a  confidence  resting 
on  something  else  than  a  mere  belief  in  the  arbitrary 

1  National  Religious,  p.  118.     Compare  also  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel, 
p.  20. 


316  Ethic  Monotheism. 

might  of  Jahaveli.  We  conclude,  therefore,  that  what 
Kuenen  calls  the  prophetic  belief  must  have  been  in 
existence  from  such  an  early  period — was  indeed  pre- 
prophetic;  that  in  fact  pre-prophetic  and  prophetic  are 
identical,  both  resting  on  some  historical  experience. 

Even  more  inadequate,  in  my  opinion,  is  his  attempt 
to  prove  that  the  j'^'^ophdic  belief  was  brought  about  by 
political  events.  Kuenen  seems  to  be  so  well  satisfied 
with  Wellhausen's  statement  of  the  case  here,^  that  he 
contents  himself  with  repeating  his  words  almost  ver- 
batim.    The  passage  is  as  follows: — 

"Until  the  time  of  Amos  there  had  subsisted  in  Palestine  and 
Syria  a  number  of  petty  kingdoms  and  nationalities,  which  had 
their  friendships  and  enmities  with  one  another,  but  paid  no  heed 
to  anything  outside  their  own  immediate  environment,  and  re- 
volved, each  in  its  own  axis,  careless  of  the  outside  world,^  until 
suddenly  the  Assyrians  burst  in  upon  them.  They  commenced  the 
work  which  was  carried  on  by  the  Babylonians,  Persians,  and 
Greeks,  and  completed  by  the  Eomans.  They  introduced  a  new 
factor,  the  conception  of  the  world — the  world,  of  course,  in  the 
historical  sense  of  that  expression.  In  presence  of  that  conception, 
the  petty  nationalities  lost  their  centre  of  gravity,  brute  force  dis- 
pelled their  ilhisions,  they  flung  their  gods  to  the  moles  and  to  the 
bats  (Isa.  ii.)  The  prophets  of  Israel  alone  did  not  allow  themselves 
to  be  taken  by  surprise  by  what  had  occurred,  or  to  be  plunged  in 
despair ;  they  solved  by  anticipation  the  grim  problem  which  his- 
tory set  before  them.  They  absorbed  into  their  religion  that  con- 
ception of  the  world  which  was  destroying  the  religions  of  the 
nations,  even  before  it  had  been  fully  grasped  by  the  secular  con- 
sciousness. Where  others  saw  only  the  ruin  of  everything  that  is 
holiest,  they  saw  the  triumph  of  Jehovah  over  delusion  and  error." 

I  humbly  think  that  the  language  here  used  is  badly 
chosen  at  the  very  point  where  we  want  the  utmost  clear- 
ness.    If  the  words  are  to  be  taken  literally,  it  is  little 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  472.  Kuenen,  National  Religions,  pp. 
120-125. 

2  See  Note  XXIII, 


Prophetic  CoTiception  of  the  World,  317 

wonder  that  the  nationalities  lost  their  centre  of  gravity, 
or  even  their  gravity  itself,  over  the  performance  here 
ascribed  to  a  "  conception."  A  "conception"  of  the  world 
was  introduced  by  the  Assyrians  ;  at  its  presence  the  petty 
nationalities  lost  their  centre  of  gravity ;  the  prophets  of 
Israel  alone  did  not  allow  themselves  to  be  taken  by  sur- 
prise; they  "absorbed"  into  their  religion  that  conception, 
"  even  before  it  had  been  fully  grasped  by  the  secular  con- 
sciousness,"— and  the  thing  was  done.  Let  us,  however,  try 
to  get  behind  the  phrases  and  understand  the  thing  that  is 
supposed  to  have  actually  happened.  The  Assyrians  ap- 
peared upon  the  narrow  stage  on  which  Israel  and  other 
little  nationalities  moved.  With  their  appearance  arose 
the  conception  of  the  world  in  the  usual  historical  sense 
— i.e.,  I  suppose  the  petty  nationalities  came  to  under- 
stand that  there  was  a  world  much  larger  than  their  own 
circumscribed  territory,  and  agencies  at  work  superior  to 
those  witli  which  they  were  familiar.  If  the  most  of  the 
petty  nations  threw  their  idols  to  the  moles  and  to  the 
bats,  it  would  be  because  they  were  convinced  that  these, 
their  own  gods,  were  of  no  avail  to  resist  the  stronger 
power,  which,  under  the  patronage  of  foreign  gods,  was 
trampling  down  petty  nationalities  like  their  own.  The 
"conception,"  therefore,  which  is  not  a  thing  floating  in 
the  air,  but  a  product  of  reflection,  arose  in  the  minds  of 
Israel's  neighbours  as  well  as  in  the  minds  of  the  prophets. 
This  is  all  plain  enough ;  but  when  we  come  to  the  vital 
point.  Why  did  the  prophets  of  Israel  take  a  different 
view  ?  we  have  no  explanation  of  the  fact.  We  are 
simply  told  they  "absorbed  the  conception  into  their 
own  religion,  even  before  it  had  been  fully  grasped  by 
the  secular  consciousness."  That  is  to  say,  before  even 
the  secular  consciousness  had  fully  grasped  the  fact  that 


318  Ethic  Monotheism,         —  ^    - 

there  were  greater  powers  outside  their  narrow  confines- 
than  their  local  national  gods,  the  prophets  at  once 
started  to  declare  that  it  was  their  own  national  God 
that  was  controlling  these  forces — at  once  they  leaped 
from  the  idea  of  a  local  national  deity  to  that  of  a  deity 
controlling  the  world ;  or,  at  all  events,  they  saw  a  divine 
plan,  a  Providence  in  all  these  things,  which  so  staggered 
others.  Then,  I  suppose,  it  was  that  the  shifting  took 
place  in  the  conception  of  the  attributes  of  Jahaveh,  and 
He  came  to  be  conceived  as  One  with  not  only  moral 
attributes,  but  with  ethical  character.  I  cannot  see  that 
the  thing  is  made  any  clearer,  or  that  the  development 
is  made  out.  What  we  w^ant  to  know  is,  What  enabled 
the  prophets  alone  to  read  the  signs  of  tlie  times  as  they 
did?  Their  teaching,  in  face  of  the  events,  is  a  clear 
proof  that  from  the  first  utterance  of  it  they  had  a  higher 
idea  of  their  God  to  start  with.  The  solution  of  the 
political  problem  was  indeed  ready  before  the  problem 
presented  itself,  just  because  the  idea  of  a  God  whose 
character  was  ethical  was  a  much  older  idea.  The 
earliest  writing  prophets  knew  of  a  God  different  from 
the  gods  of  the  nations  around  them ;  and  they  them- 
selves speak  of  such  a  God  as  revealing  Himself  to 
prophets  before  them.  Even  the  writer  or  writers  of 
the  patriarchal  stories,  and  the  writer  of  the  accounts 
of  Elijah,  at  a  time  when  there  was  no  threatening  of  a 
collapse  of  the  State  from  foreign  invasion,  have  pure 
ethical  conceptions  of  Jahaveh,  and  regard  Him  as  con- 
trolling the  destinies  of  the  world.  The  conception  of 
Jahaveh  as  a  Euler  of  the  world  is  much  older  than  the 
time  in  which  Kuenen  and  his  school  would  place  it; 
and  it  is  in  vain  that  we  ask  the  outward  events  of  the 
history  to  give  an  explanation  of  that  religious  conscious- 


Dcvelojj7)ient  demanded.  319 

ness  which,  from  the  earliest  times,  underlies  all  these 
events. 

3.  But  in  tlie  third  place,  let  us  leave  abstract  in- 
quiries into  what  must  have  happened,  and  this  subtle 
following  of  the  movement  of  a  conception :  let  us  come 
to  actual  facts.  If  it  be  true  that  the  appearance  of  the 
Assyrians  gave  the  first  impulse  to  this  wider  view,  the 
view  is  so  far  removed  from  what  is  called  the  pre-pro- 
phetic  conception  that  we  ought  to  see  it  growing  under 
our  eyes.  At  the  Assyrian  period,  we  have  the  con- 
temporary writings  of  Amos  and  Hosea ;  and  from  them 
onwards,  we  have  the  writings  of  other  prophets  who 
lived  through  the  trying  times  of  the  Assyrian  invasions, 
and  down  to  the  Babylonian  captivity.  Amos  speaks 
only  in  the  vaguest  terms  of  the  great  Assyrian  power ; 
Isaiah  saw  it  in  the  land ;  Jeremiah  witnessed  the  final 
collapse  of  Israelite  independence.  We  ought  to  be  able 
to  trace  the  gradual  expansion  of  the  prophetic  view,  from 
its  first  stage  to  its  last.  Now  what  do  we  find?  We 
find  indeed  an  advance  from  Amos  to  Jeremiah  as  to 
the  conditions  on  which  the  relation  of  Jahaveh  to  Israel 
rests,  and  in  regard  to  the  relation  of  the  Jahaveh  religion 
to  the  outside  world ;  but  within  the  range  of  written 
prophecy  we  do  not  find  the  development  of  the  idea  of 
Jahaveh  Himself.  In  regard  to  the  conception  that  He 
controls  the  whole  world,  there  is  no  difference  in  the 
teaching  of  Amos  and  Jeremiah.  I  know  that  Wellhausen 
and  Stade  would  reject  all  passages  in  Amos^  which 
express  such  high  views  of  Jahaveh's  character,  on  the 
ground  that  they  disturb  the  connection,  Eobertson 
Smith ,2   though   he    does   not   reject   them,  says  mildly 

1  Such  passages  as  Amos  iv.  13,  v.  8  ff.,  ix.  1-7.     See  chap.  vi.  p.  146. 

2  Prophets  of  Israel,  p.  398  f. 


320  Ethic  Monotheism. 

that  they  are  not  necessary  for  the  imderstandmg  of 
the  context ;  and  he  refers,  apparently  with  favour,  to 
Wellhausen's  explanation  of  their  presence  in  the  text — 
that  they  are  lyrical  intermezzi,  like  those  that  are  found 
so  frequently  in  the  Deutero-Isaiah.  Lyrical  intermezzi 
forsootli !  Any  one  with  the  least  sympathy  with  the 
\vriters  will  recognise  in  them  the  outpourings  of  hearts 
that  were  full  of  the  noblest  conceptions  of  the  God 
whom  they  celebrate,  and  will  perceive  that  they  come 
in  most  fitly  to  emphasise  the  context. 

On  this  point  Kuenen  has  to  defend  himself,  and  he 
explains  at  length  ^  his  position  as  compared  with  that  of 
Baudissin  and  contrasted  with  that  of  H.  Schultz.  His  ex- 
planation amounts  to  this,  that,  if  the  prophets  of  the  eighth 
century  use  expressions  concerning  Jahaveh's  supremacy 
over  the  heathen  world  as  well  as  Israel,  and  concerning  the 
gods  of  the  heathen,  which  practically  amount  to  a  denial  of 
the  existence  of  the  latter,  this  shows  that  they  belong  to 
a  period  of  transition  or  of  nascent  monotheism.  Traces 
of  this  are  still  to  be  found  distinctly  in  Deuteronomy 
itself.^  This  nascent  monotheism  in  the  prophets  of  tlie 
eiglith  century  Kuenen  describes  as  "  a  repeated  overstep- 
ping of  the  line  between  monolatry  and  the  recognition 
of  one  only  God."  He  says :  "  I  recognise  monotheism  de 
facto  in  these  strong  expressions  of  the  prophets,  and  only 
deny  that  they  had  acquired  it  as  a  permanent  possession. 
Now  and  then  they  rise  to  the  recognition  of  the  sole 
existence  of  Jahaveh,  and  the  denial  of  "the  other  gods"; 
"  but  generally  they  do  not  get  beyond  the  monolatry  in 
which  they,  or  at  any  rate  the  earlier  ones  among  them, 
had  been  brought  up."    He  maintains,  however,  in  opposi- 

^  National  Eeligions,  note  vii.  p.  317  ff. 
2  Theol.  Review,  1874,  pp.  347-351. 


Nascent  Monotheism.  321 

tion  to  Schultz,  that  "the  still  older  monotheism  of  the 
period  before  the  prophets  has  no  existence." 

Now,  if  we  examine  this  so-called  nascent  monotheism, 
which  is  admitted  to  be  de  facto  monotheism,  we  find 
it  full-grown  at  its  birth.  Amos,  the  earliest  writing 
prophet,  utters  it  in  clear  tones,  as  a  familiar  and  ad- 
mitted truth,  in  saying  that  Jahaveh  had  brought  the 
Philistines  from  Caphtor  and  the  Syrians  from  Kir,  as  he 
had  brought  Israel  from  Egypt,  and  in  ever  representing 
righteousness  as  the  basis  of  the  divine  character.  A 
being  whose  character  is  ethical,  and  whose  rule  unerr- 
ingly controls  the  destinies  of  all  nations  alike  (Amos  ix. 
7),  is  infinitely  more  than  a  national  god,  such  as  heathen 
nations  conceived  their  deities ;  and  in  no  case  does  Amos 
give  any  countenance  to  the  so-called  monolatry,  as  if 
the  monotheism  he  taught  was  held  loosely  in  his  hands. 
But  what  are  we  to  think  of  Kue.nen's  position  that  this 
nascent  monotheism  is  also  still  to  be  found  a  century 
after  Amos  in  the  book  of  Deuteronomy  ?  It  is  there 
de  facto  in  Amos  ;  still  a  century  later  it  is  only  nascent ; 
whereas  in  Elijah,  a  century  before  Amos,  it  has  no 
existence,  although  in  another  connection  both  are  de- 
clared to  be  equally  organs  of  the  Jahaveh  religion.  And 
we  are  to  accept  all  this  on  the  "I  recognise"  and  "I 
maintain  "  of  Dr  Kuenen.  In  regard  to  the  ethical  char- 
acter of  Jahaveh,  Amos  and  Hosea  were  just  as  bold  and 
firm  in  chiding  the  sins  of  their  contemporaries  as  Isaiah, 
who  on  this  theory  is  supposed  to  have  attained  a  con- 
ception of  holiness  which  was  only  nascent  in  these  earlier 
prophets;  and  the  prophets  that  follow  Isaiah  are  not 
more  emphatic  in  the  same  strain,  and  yet  they  do  not, 
like  Isaiah,  call  Jahaveh  the  Holy  One  of  Israel.  In 
fact,   this   explanation    of    the    rise    of    pure    monothe- 

X 


322  Ethic  Monotheism. 

ism  is  artificial  in  the  extreme,  and  the  "ethic  mono- 
theism "  is  merely  a  pretentious  phrase.  The  same  truth 
that  Amos  proclaimed  finds  expression  in  the  words  put 
in  the  mouth  of  Abraham  by  the  Jehovistic  narrator, 
"  Shall  not  the  Judge  of  all  the  world  do  right  ? "  (Gen. 
xviii.  25)  ;  it  was  de  facto  held  by  Elijah  and  the  seven 
thousand  who  like  him  would  not  bow  the  knee  to  Baal ; 
it  was  held  also  by  Samuel  when  he  set  up  the  stone 
Ebenezer,  saying,  Hitherto  Jahaveh  hath  helped  us :  ^  and 
these  men  could  not  have  asserted  it,  one  after  the  other, 
so  emphatically  as  they  did,  in  times  of  deepest  national 
depression,  unless  it  had  been  deeply  impressed  on  the 
hearts  of  the  best  of  the  nation  from  the  early  times  at 
which  the  Biblical  writers  assume  it. 

4.  Lastly,  let  us  come  back  to  Kuenen's  emphasised  as- 
sertion that  the  prophets  agreed  with  the  people  in  the 
tenacity  with  which  they  clung  to  the  belief  that  Jahaveh 
and  Israel  were  inseparable.  The  point  is  not  disputed  ; 
but  surely  such  a  conviction  must  have  been  based 
upon  something  definite  and  positive,  and  it  is  most 
reasonable  to  assume  that  that  something  was  believed 
to  be  inherent  in  the  nature  of  Jahaveh  Himself.  If  the 
nation  believed  that  He  would  never  give  them  up,  how- 
ever far  they  fell  from  Him ;  if  the  prophets  believed 
that  He  would  never  give  them  up,  and  even  would  have 
ar' special  favour  for  them  when  He  became  the  God  of  all 
the  families  of  mankind, — there  must  have  been  in  the 
minds  of  all  a  belief  of  some  quality  strong  enough  to 
bind  Jahaveh  in  this  inseparable  manner  to  His  own 
people.  Neither  'might,'  nor  holiness  in  its  terrifying 
aspect,  will  explain  this.  Now  such  a  quality  or  character 
we  do  find  ascribed  to  Him  by  the  earliest  prophets, 
although  it  is  a  quality  to  which  I  think  Kuenen  makes 

^  Kouig,  Hauptprobleme,  p.  44  f. 


Bond  of  Popidar  and  FropJietic  Conceptions.        323 

no  reference.  It  is  an  attribute,  witliout  taking  account 
of  which  we  can  neither  understand  the  Old  nor  the  New 
Testament.  I  call  it,  without  hesitation,  the  quality  of 
grace.  In  various  ways  the  belief  in  it  comes  out;  by 
various  names  the  shades  of  its  signification  are  expressed ; 
but  this  variety  only  shows  how  central,  to  use  Kuenen's 
own  word,  this  attribute  was  in  the  conception.  And  I 
am  not  to  reason  from  abstract  principles  here,  or  from  the 
whole  tenor  of  Biblical  teaching.  I  take  as  witness  one  of 
the  earliest  of  the  writing  prophets,  who  lived  at  the  very 
time  Kuenen's  supposed  development  should  have  been 
taking  place,  and  it  is  marvellous  to  me  that  Kuenen  and 
other  writers  could  have  passed  by  a  witness  whose  testi- 
mony is  so  precise.  The  whole  of  Hosea's  book  turns 
upon  that  idea, — God  had  loved  Israel  in  the  time  of  the 
nation's  youth ;  and  the  touching  story  (or  figure)  of  the 
wayward  wife,  going  her  own  evil  course,  yet  not  rejected, 
— ^just  because  her  husband  had  loved  her  at  first, — and 
finally  brought  back,  and  by  the  power  of  love  taught  to 
love  her  husband, — all  this  is  applied  for  us  by  the  pro- 
phet himself  to  the  history  of  Israel.^  Here  is  another 
attribute  than  either  might  or  holiness — and  it  is  here  at 
the  very  dawn  of  written  prophecy,  and  placed  by  the 
prophet  at  the  dawn  of  the  national  history — an  attribute 
which  surely  raises  the  character  of  Jahaveh  to  a  higher 
level,  and  casts  light  upon  the  apparent  contradictious 
which  Kuenen  has  exhibited.  Jahaveh  was,  above  all 
things,  "  faithful."  He  had  done  great  things  for  Israel 
(Amos  ii.  9-11)  in  the  past  out  of  mere  grace,  not  be- 
cause they  had  deserved  it.  The  prophet  Amos  also, 
though  he  dwells  more  on  the  righteousness  of  Jahaveh, 
does  not  leave  out  of  account  the  divine  love  and  mercy. 

^  This  is  the  substance,  under  any  interpretation,  of  chapters  i.  to  iii. 
See  also  chapter  xi.  8  ff.,  "  How  shall  I  give  thee  up,  Ephraim  ? " 


324  Etliic  Monotheism. 

Tliese  attributes  are  implied  in  the  great  thinj^s  tliat 
had  been  done  for  the  nation  in  the  past,  and  emphati- 
cally taught  in  the  7th  chapter  in  the  repeated  visions 
of  the  prophet,  in  which  the  Lord  "  repents "  of  the  evil 
about  to  be  inflicted  on  His  people :  "  It  shall  not  be, 
saitli  Jahaveh."  We  get  thus,  instead  of  mere  reasonings 
as  to  how  conceptions  arise,  positive  historical  facts  as  the 
means  of  producing  the  idea  which  was  held  so  tenaciously 
to  the  last.  If  the  people  perverted  this  doctrine,  and 
sinned  that  grace  might  abound ;  if  they  presumed  that, 
because  Jahaveh  could  not  deny  Himself,  therefore  they 
miglit  sin  and  repent, — this  is  no  more  than  thousands 
have  done  in  the  times  of  the  Gospel.  But  their  tenacity 
to  the  belief  that  He  luould  not  forsake  them  can  hardly 
be  explained  without  such  a  belief  underlying  it.  Even 
their  redoubled  zeal  in  the  matter  of  vows  and  offer- 
ings, taken  in  connection  with  this  belief  in  Jahaveh's 
faithfulness,  is  not  without  its  significance, — not  as  show- 
ing that  they  believed  these  would  turn  the  faithful 
One  from  His  purpose,  but  as  showing  that  they  recog- 
nised them  as  the  outward  expression  of  their  faithfulness, 
or  promise  of  faithfulness,  on  their  part.  At  all  events, 
this  unconquerable  conviction,  which  the  prophets  held 
in  a  purer,  and  the  people  in  a  more  corrupted  form, 
guarantees  the  conclusion  that  both  alike  recognised  in 
the  character  of  Jahaveh  an  attribute  which  had  a  more 
personal  relation  to  them  than  either  the  attribute  of 
might  or  that  of  holiness,  an  attribute  which  Hosca 
simply  calls  love  ;  which  will  explain,  on  the  one  side.  His 
forgiveness  of  offences,  and  on  the  other  His  unalterable 
care  and  regard.  And  therefore  we  are  entitled  to  con- 
clude tliat  ihiQ  fundamentcd  conception  of  Jahaveh  under- 
lying the  views  of  people  and  prophets  together,  was 
substantially   that   embodied   in   the  declaration  of   His 


JahaveKs  Character  proclaimed  to  Moses.  325 

character,  which  is  by  the  Biblical  writers  placed  as  far 
back  as  the  time  of  Moses  (Exocl.  xxxiv.  6,  7,  E.V.) : 
"  Jahaveh,  Jahaveh^a  God  full  of  compassion  and  gracious, 
slow  to  anger  and  plenteous  in  mercy  and  truth ;  keeping 
mercy  for  thousands,  forgiving  iniquity  and  transgression 
and  sin ;  and  that  will  by  no  means  clear  the  guilty ; 
visiting  the  iniquity  of  the  fathers  upon  the  children,  and 
upon  the  children's  children,  upon  the  third  and  upon  the 
fourth  generation,"  It  seems  to  me  that  if  we  place  at 
the  outset  such  a  conception  of  Jahaveh,  which  is  two- 
sided,  and  capable  of  expansion  in  two  different  lines,  we 
can  account  for  the  development  of  the  popular  idea 
equally  with  that  of  the  prophets  from  one  common 
source ;  that  we  can  give  some  explanation  of  the  clear- 
ness with  which  the  very  earliest  of  the  writing  prophets 
represent  the  character  of  the  national  God,  and  also  the 
persistency  with  which  the  people  held  to  their  view 
to  the  last.  We  obtain,  in  a  word,  development  from  a 
definite  starting  -  point,  whereas  on  Kuenen's  view  we 
neither  find  a  reasonable  meeting  -  point  for  the  two 
divergent  tendencies,  nor  can  follow  the  steps  in  the 
development  of  either  the  one  or  the  other. 

"The  principles  which  we  see  operating  from  the 
earliest  times,"  says  Professor  A.  B.  Davidson,  "  are  the 
principles  wielded  by  the  prophets.  They  are  few  but 
comprehensive.  They  form  the  essence  of  the  moral  law 
' — consisting  of  two  principles  and  a  fact, — namely,  that 
Jehovah  was  Israel's  God  alone ;  and  that  His  being  was 
ethical,  demanding  a  moral  life  among  those  who  served 
Him  as  His  people:  and  these  two  principles  elevated 
into  a  high  emotional  unity  in  the  consciousness  of  re- 
demption just  experienced."^ 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  v.  p.  43. 


326 


CHAPTER    XIII. 

AUTHORITATIVE   INSTITUTIONS — THEIR  EARLY  DATE 

Connection  of  this  with  the  preceding — Ecasons  for  postponing  consideration 
of  forms,  (1)  because  practice  is  not  a  sure  index  of  profession,  and  (2) 
because  external  forms,  even  when  authorised,  are  not  sufficient  index  of 
the  truth  of  which  they  are  signs — Mode  of  procedure  as  before — Three 
things  to  be  distinguished.  Law,  Codification  of  Law,  Writing  of  Law- 
books, on  all  of  which  the  Biblical  theory  allows  a  latitude  of  view — 
Points  at  which  the  Biblical  and  the  modern  view  are  at  variance — The 
conclusions  of  the  modern  theory,  (1)  Law  not  of  Mosaic  origin,  (2)  Codes 
so  inconsistent  that  they  must  be  of  different  dates — Position  similar  to 
that  before  assumed — Presumption  that  Moses  gave  definite  laws — The 
Covenant,  how  signalised  —  Proofs  from  prophetical  writers;  from 
Psalms  ;  from  admitted  historical  boohs — Conclusion  that  a  Norm  or 
Law,  outside  of  prophets  and  superior  to  them,  was  acknowledged — 
What  was  itt 

Up  to  this  point  the  object  of  our  inquiry  has  been 
to  determine,  as  far  as  possible,  what  the  religion  of 
Israel  was,  in  its  essential  and  internal  elements,  at  the 
earliest  period  to  which  we  have  access.  We  have  ex- 
amined the  testimony  given  by  the  earliest  admitted 
written  sources  to  the  nature  of  the  religion  at  the  date 
to  which  they  belong,  and  have  endeavoured  to  estimate 
the  value  of  this  class  of  witnesses  for  the  determina- 
tion of  the  religion  of  an  antecedent  and  early  time. 
Without  relying  on  disputed  books,  we  have  found  that 


Connection  with  preceding  Discussion.  327 

those  which  are  admitted  confirm  in  many  ways  the 
statements  of  those  which  are  not  primarily  taken  into 
account.  The  earliest  writing  prophets,  though  not  ap- 
pealing to  the  authority  of  books,  appeal  to  admitted  and 
undeniable  facts  which  are  asserted  in  these  books ;  and 
our  conclusion  has  been,  that  whereas  the  modern  theory 
is  obliged  to  overstrain  those  admitted  facts  of  history 
and  experience  which  have  a  show  of  being  in  its  favour, 
and  to  underrate  those  which  seem  to  oppose  it,  the 
Biblical  theory  is  confirmed  in  the  main,  and  that  the 
religion  of  Israel  had,  at  a  much  earlier  stage  than  the 
modern  critical  writers  admit,  the  purer  and  more  ethical 
character  which  they  would  relegate  to  a  later  time. 

We  come  now  to  consider  whether  in  outward  form 
also  and  positive  institutions  the  religion  of  Israel  had 
not,  before  the  time  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets, 
or  before  the  time  at  which  modern  critical  writers 
place  such  an  organisation,  a  more  defined  shape  and 
authoritative  arrangement  than  the  modern  historians 
allow.  The  two  things  are  closely  connected.  Eeligious 
belief  and  practice  always  act  and  react  upon  one  another. 
According  to  the  Biblical  view,  as  there  was  an  early 
revelation  of  spiritual  truth;  so  there  was  an  early  in- 
stitution of  law  and  religious  observance.  On  the 
modern  view  also  the  two  things  are  intimately  related. 
Wellhausen  says,^  "All  writers  of  the  Chaldsean  period 
associate  monotheism  in  the  closest  way  with  unity  of 
worship ; "  and  it  is  a  fundamental  element  of  his  theory 
that  the  process  of  centralisation  and  spiritualisation 
which  marks  the  development  of  the  law  and  worship 
went  on  under  prophetic  influence  and  pari  passu  with 
the  development  of  prophetic  thought  and  teaching.^ 

»  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  27.  ^  ibij.;  cf.  p.  26  with  47,  81,  103. 


328      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Bate. 

It  might  seem  at  first  sight  that  it  would  have  been 
more  proper  to  begin  with  outward  observances,  which 
are  so  obvious  and  give  so  tangible  a  representation  of  a 
people's  religious  belief;  and  then  to  reason  from  them 
to  the  essential  character  of  the  religion.  There  are, 
however,  these  two  considerations  to  be  taken  into  ac- 
count. (1)  In  the  first  place,  outward  observance  is  not 
always,  nor  indeed  generally,  a  faithful  indication  of 
religious  profession;  and  when  we  are  in  search,  as  we 
are  in  this  case,  of  a  religion  which  claims  to  have  been 
positively  given  with  definite  fundamental  principles  as 
well  as  formal  institutions,  it  would  be  unfair  to  rest 
either  upon  the  moral  practice  or  the  religious  usages  of 
a  people  making  profession  of  such  a  religion.  Forms 
may  be  perverted,  obscured,  or  corrupted,  and  the  life  of 
the  people  is  pretty  certain  to  fall  short  of  tlieir  faith. 
We  might,  for  example,  from  the  mere  observance  of  facts 
and  ]Dhenomena  gather  what  was  the  "  state  of  religion," 
as  we  use  the  phrase,  in  any  given  age  of  the  Christian 
Church,  but  we  would  not  be  safe,  from  the  mere  contem- 
plation of  any  age,  in  drawing  a  conclusion  as  to  the 
essential  character  of  Christianity.  To  argue  from  custom 
or  observance  in  religion  to  the  requirements  and  essence 
of  religion  would,  in  the  case  before  us,  be  begging  the 
question,  which  is  virtually  as  to  whether  or  not  there 
was  an  ideal  or  positive  religion  to  start  with.  By 
examining,  as  we  have  done,  first  of  all  the  writings  of 
the  prophets,  we  gain  some  guiding  light  on  this  the 
fundamental  point.  And  (2)  in  the  second  place,  outward 
rites  and  ceremonies,  in  a  special  manner,  do  not  furnish 
a  sufficient  indication  of  the  truth  of  which  they  are 
symbols  or  concomitants.  In  such  rites  there  has  often 
been  a  carrying  over  and  adaptation  of  old  customary 


OhseiDances  a7id  their  Significance.  329 

observances,  which  are  in  this  transference  invested  with 
a  new  meaning.  Many  of  the  observances  of  Christen- 
dom are  of  this  description ;  even  the  sacraments  of 
the  New  Testament  rest,  as  symbolic  ordinances,  upon 
earlier  usages,  although  in  the  Gospel  they  are  in- 
vested with  new  meaning.  So  also  it  is  well  known 
that  some  of  the  observances  that  are  now  characteristic 
of  Islam  were  adopted  and  adapted  from  pre-existing 
Arabian  usages.  In  any  of  these  cases,  to  argue  from  the 
forms,  without  knowing  what  they  were  meant  to  signify, 
would  be  manifestly  and  grossly  unfair.  It  would  be 
similar  to  the  false  reasoning,  which  we  have  had  occasion 
to  notice  already,  from  the  primary  or  etymological 
signification  of  a  word,  without  taking  note  of  the  sense 
in  which,  at  a  given  time  and  in  a  particular  context, 
it  is  employed.  And  it  is  necessary  now  to  enter  this 
caveat^  because,  as  we  shall  have  occasion  to  notice, 
this  mode  of  reasoning  is  not  a  little  relied  on  in  the 
treatment  of  this  subject.  Certain  observances  of  the 
Israelite  religion,  which  are  represented  by  the  Biblical 
writers  as  commemorative  or  symbolical  of  national 
religious  facts,  have  the  outward  forms  of  old  observances 
or  popular  customs,  and  several  of  them  are  connected 
with  the  cycle  of  the  natural  year;  and  the  conclusion 
is  drawn,  that  down  to  a  very  recent  period  the  sacred 
festivals  signified  nothing  more  than  the  bare  outward 
form  expressed.  Hence  the  necessity  of  determining,  first 
of  all,  as  we  have  endeavoured  to  do,  whether  in  religious 
conceptions  and  beliefs  Israel  had  not  at  a  much  earlier 
period  passed  beyond  the  elements  of  a  mere  naturalistic 
faith.  Hence  also  the  necessity  of  caution  in  reasoning 
from  the  mere  outward  concomitants  and  expressions  of 
religion  to  the  essence  of  the  thing  signified.  ^ 


'330      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Date. 

No  doubt  a  certain  prepossession,  on  the  one  side  or 
the  other,  arising  out  of  the  preceding  inquiry,  attends  us 
as  we  enter  on  this  part  of  the  subject.  If  we  admit  the 
conclusion  that  the  religion  of  Israel  was  gradually  evolved 
or  developed  from  an  animistic  stage,  we  shall  scarcely 
expect  to  find  in  the  pre-prophetic  period  institutions  of 
a  high  moral  significance ;  but  if,  on  the  contrary,  we  are 
satisfied  that  the  religion  was  in  its  earlier  and  funda- 
mental stage  of  a  more  ethical  and  exalted  character,  it 
will  not  surprise  us  to  find,  in  the  period  referred  to,  a  set 
of  religious  institutions  in  keeping  with  and  expressing 
the  higher  class  of  conceptions.  We  shall,  however, 
endeavour  to  consider  this  part  of  the  subject  indepen- 
dently of  any  conclusions  already  reached ;  and  in  doing 
so,  to  follow  the  same  method  of  procedure  as  before. 
From  the  known  and  admitted  we  shall  seek  to  make 
our  way  to  the  unknown  or  disputed ;  endeavouring  from 
clear  indications  of  the  records  which  are  unquestioned  to 
make  out  the  state  of  religious  ordinances  of  their  time, 
and  the  testimony  which  they  may  give  to  a  greater 
antiquity.  And  here  again  what  is  primarily  to  be  de- 
termined is,  not  the  date  of  certain  books  in  which  the 
formal  statement  and  prescription  of  outward  observances 
are  contained,  but  the  existence  of  the  institutions,  or  the 
knowledge  of  the  prescriptions  at  the  time  and  on  the 
part  of  the  writers  whose  dates  are  known.  If  we  shall 
find  that  the  witnesses  who  are  available  testify  to  the 
existence  of  laws  and  ordinances  such  as  are  found  in  the 
documents  whose  date  is  unknown,  there  is  a  strong 
presumption  that  these  ordinances  are  the  things  we  are 
in  search  of ;  and  even  if  the  documents  in  which  they 
are  embodied  should  be  of  late  composition,  they  will  to 
us  still  retain  substantially  their  historical  value. 


Laiu,  Law-Codes,  and  Law-Books.  331 

In  the  inquiry  now  before  us  there  are  three  things 
which  are  easily  distinguishable,  and  which  ought  to  be 
kept  distinct  in  our  minds.  These  are,  (a)  the  origin  of 
laws  and  observances,  (h)  the  codification  of  laws,  or  the 
formal  ratification  of  observances,  and  (c)  the  composition 
of  the  books  in  which  we  find  the  laws  finally  embodied 
or  the  ordinances  described.  Laws  and  institutions  may 
grow  out  of  custom,  or  they  may  be  matter  of  formal 
enactment ;  but  in  either  case  they  may  exist  for  a  longer 
or  shorter  time  without  being  embodied  in  written  pre- 
scriptions. Again,  the  writing  down  of  such  prescriptions 
may  be  a  gradual  process,  and  result  in  the  formation  of 
more  than  one  code  ;  but  even  after  laws  are  codified  and 
institutions  enacted,  all  experience  proves  that  they  may 
undergo  modification.  Finally,  the  writing  of  a  book  or 
books,  in  which  codes  or  collections  of  laws  and  prescrip- 
tions of  observances  are  strung  upon  a  historical  thread 
may  quite  conceivably  be  a  work  later  than  the  formation 
of  separate  codes,  and  much  later  than  the  origination  of 
the  laws  or  ordinances. 

A  full  investigation  into  all  these  subjects  would  take 
us  very  far  afield ;  but  we  are  kept  within  limitations  by 
the  nature  of  our  present  inquiry,  and  also  by  the  circum- 
stances of  the  case.  We  are  not  called  upon,  for  example, 
to  go  into  the  abstract  question  of  the  origin  of  law  and 
institutions,  any  more  than  in  the  former  part  of  our 
inquiry  we  had  to  investigate  the  origin  of  religion.  The 
Biblical  writers  maintain  that  from  a  certain  historical 
period  onwards — viz.,  from  the  time  of  Moses — Israel  had 
a  certain  body  of  positive  institutions  (just  as  they  assert 
that  from  Abraham's  time  they  had  a  pure  faith);  and 
that  these  institutions  are  embodied  in  certain  law-books 
which   are   preserved   to   us.      Our   inquiry  is  therefore 


332      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Date. 

limited  to  a  certain  time,  and  concentrated  upon  certain 
subjects.  It  is  also  important  to  observe  that,  on  all  the 
three  points  just  indicated,  in  so  far  as  they  are  elements 
of  the  inquiry  into  the  history  of  the  religion  of  Israel, 
various  views  may  be  held,  and  that  the  Biblical  theory, 
within  certain  limitations,  leaves  room  for  great  latitude 
of  view  on  details,  {a)  Eeligious  observances,  such  as 
sacrifice,  are  spoken  of  as  matters  of  course,  and  existing 
before  there  was  formal  legislation  in  regard  to  them. 
Even  the  so-called  Grundschrift  or  Priestly  Code  does  not 
exclude  sacrifices  from  the  patriarchal  age,  nor  represent 
them  as  originating  in  the  time  of  Moses.  Nor  is  there 
anything  either  in  history  or  in  the  nature  of  the  case  to 
make  it  improbable  that  usage  at  a  certain  point  was 
stamped  with  the  authority  of  law.  (h)  Further,  if  we  take 
the  statements  of  the  law-books  themselves,  we  are  led  to 
the  conclusion  that  the  laws  therein  contained  were 
written  down  at  different  times.  Moses  is  said  to  have 
written  this  and  that,  and  in  regard  to  many  more,  it  is 
not  said  who  wrote  them  at  all.  In  regard  to  the  collec- 
tions of  laws  in  particular — while  it  is  said  that  Moses 
wrote  the  laws  of  the  book  of  the  Covenant  and  the 
Deuteronomic  Code  —  it  is  not  said  that  he  wrote  the 
Levitical  laws,  nor  are  we  told  who  wrote  them,  (c)  And 
finally,  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch,  as  composite  produc- 
tions, containing  both  law  and  history,  are  anonymous 
compositions,  and  may  have  assumed  their  present  form 
after  the  laws  had  existed  for  a  time  as  a  separate  code 
or  codes.  It  is  greatly  to  be  lamented  that  so  much  has 
been  made  of  the  mere  question  of  the  authorship  of  these 
books  containing  the  laws.  Although  other  books,  which 
are  also  anonymous,  are  accepted  as  materials  for  history, 
although  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch,  with  supreme  in- 


Tivo  Theories  again  opposed,  333 

differencG,  say  nothing  about  their  authorship,  it  has  been 
tacitly  assumed  that  their  whole  value  stands  or  falls 
with  their  Mosaic  or  non-Mosaic  authorship.  A  broad 
distinction  is  evident  between  the  questions,  By  whose  in- 
strumentality or  authority  was  law  given  ?  and.  By  whose 
hands  were  books  written  which  contain  the  law  ?  The 
essential  question  is  not  as  to  the  early  or  late  date  of  the 
books  of  the  Pentateuch,  but  as  to  the  relation  in  which 
the  leojislation  of  the  Pentateuch  stands  to  the  whole  de- 
velopment  of  the  history. 

On  this  deeper  question  of  the  origin  and  religious 
meaning  of  the  laws  and  institutions  the  two  theories 
are  as  much  opposed  as  we  have  seen  them  elsewhere. 
For  just  as,  in  the  matter  of  religious  conception  and 
belief,  the  earlier  phase  is  toned  down  by  the  modern 
historians  to  a  naturalistic  level,  so  in  the  matter  of  law 
the  element  of  early  positive  enactment  is  minimised  to 
the  lowest  possible  degree.  Custom  and  usage  are  made 
to  account  for  the  origin  of  a  great  part  of  the  laws; 
for  ages  the  nation  is  supposed  to  have  been  without 
authoritative  law ;  and  the  actual  amount  of  influence 
exerted  by  Moses  is  so  explained  away  as  to  be  almost 
inappreciable.  On  the  other  hand,  though  the  Hebrew 
writers  do  not  say  anything  as  to  who  wrote  the  law- 
books, they  assert  positively  that  the  law  laid  down 
in  these  books  is  Mosaic.  Moreover,  the  theories  being 
opposed  as  to  the  character  of  the  Mosaic  religion,  their 
interpretation  of  the  institutions  will  vary.  To  a  deity 
who  might  be  worshipped  anywhere,  who  was  circum- 
scribed in  the  place  of  his  abode,  and  who  was  merely 
a  storm  or  sun  or  fire  god,  a  kind  of  service  might  be 
appropriate  that  would  be  without  proper  significance  in 
the  worship  of  a  deity  who  was  in  his  central  attributes 


334      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Date. 

lioly,  and  in  his  nature  spiritual.  The  Mosaic  or  pre- 
prophetic  religion  will  determine  the  significance  (if  not 
the  outward  form)  of  the  Mosaic  or  pre-prophetic  insti- 
tutions. 

It  is  clear  that  to  determine  the  point  in  dispute,  we 
must  appeal,  if  possible,  to  some  independent  testimony 
outside  the  laws  themselves  or  the  books  in  which  they 
are  contained;  and  that  the  value  we  shall  attach  to 
these  legislative  books  will  depend  on  the  conclusions  to 
be  drawn  from  such  independent  sources.  The  only  use 
that  can  be  made  of  the  laws  themselves  in  the  contro- 
versy, is  to  compare  them  with  one  another  and  with  the 
prophetical  and  historical  literature  whose  authority  is 
admitted.  Such  a  comparison  has  in  fact  been  the  task 
of  criticism.  As  a  result,  the  modern  historians  claim  to 
have  proved,  (1)  that  the  history  of  the  time  succeeding 
Moses,  and  down  to  a  comparatively  late  period,  does  not 
show  that  the  laws  claiming  to  be  Mosaic  were  in  force, 
but  shows,  on  the  contrary,  that  the  practice  of  the  best 
men  of  the  nation  was  inconsistent  with  them;  from 
which  the  inference  is  drawn,  that  these  laws  were  not  up 
to  that  time  in  existence ;  and  (2)  that  the  laws  themselves 
which  are  called  Mosaic,  when  examined  and  compared, 
are  so  inconsistent  with  one  another  that  they  cannot  all 
have  been  in  force  at  the  same  time ;  particularly  there 
are  three  codes  discernible,  which  indicate  three  distinct 
modes  of  observance,  and  must  have  belonged  to  three 
historical  periods,  widely  separated,  which  periods  can  be 
determined  by  comparing  the  requirements  of  the  respec- 
tive codes  with  the  practice  prevailing  at  different  times 
in  the  history.  In  short,  gradual  growth  by  development 
is  to  be  made  to  explain  the  origin  of  institutions,  just  as 
it  explained  the  origin  of  religious  conceptions ;  and  this 


Ascription  of  Law  to  Moses.  335 

growth  is  to  be  exhibited  within  the  field  in  which  we 
have  the  means  of  testing  conclusions  by  historical  docu- 
ments. Accordingly,  just  as  we  had  to  inquire  into  the 
elements  of  the  Mosaic  religion  of  Jahaveh,  and  trace  the 
connection  of  the  pre-prophetic  with  the  prophetic  re- 
ligion, so  here  we  have  to  inquire  into  the  origin  of  the 
laws,  and  the  consistency  of  the  codes  which  are  con- 
tained in  the  Pentateuch,  in  order  to  determine  whether, 
or  to  what  extent,  they  may  be  held  to  be,  or  proved  not  to 
be.  Mosaic.  In  the  present  chapter  we  confine  ourselves 
to  the  inquiry  whether  there  is  any  presumptive  or  any 
positive  proof  that  Moses  gave  to  Israel  such  a  positive 
legislation  as  the  law-books  exhibit. 

It  occurs  at  once  as  a  striking  thing  that  the  uniform 
tradition  is,  that  Moses  gave  laws  and  ordinances  to  Israel. 
And  that  it  is  not  a  blind  ascription  of  everything  to  some 
great  ancestor,  may  be  gathered  from  the  fact  that  there 
are  ordinances  and  customs  which  are  not  traced  to  him. 
The  Sabbath  is  made  as  old  as  the  creation ;  circumcision 
is  a  mark  of  the  covenant  with  Abraham ;  sacrifices  are 
pre-Mosaic ;  and  the  abstaining  from  the  sinew  that  shrank 
is  traced  to  the  time  of  Jacob.  The  body  of  laws,  however, 
that  formed  the  constitution  of  Israel  as  a  people,  is  in- 
variably referred  to  Moses.  There  must  be  some  histor- 
ical basis  for  the  mere  fact  that  all  the  three  successive 
codes,  as  they  are  called,  dating,  as  is  alleged,  from 
periods  separated  from  one  another  by  centuries,^  are  as- 
cribed to  Moses ;  whereas  another  alleged  code,  found  in 
the  book  of  Ezekiel,  never  obtained  authoritative  recogni- 
tion. The  persistence  with  which  it  is  represented  that  law, 
moral  and  ceremonial,  came  from  Moses,  and  the  accept- 

*  The  separate  codes  will  be  more  particularly  described  in  the  next 
chapter. 


336      Autlioritative  Institutions— their  Early  Date. 

ance  of  the  laws  by  the  whole  people  as  of  Mosaic  origin, 
proves  at  least  that  it  was  a  deeply  seated  belief  in  the 
nation  that  the  great  leader  had  given  some  formal  legal 
constitution  to  his  people.  It  seems  to  me  that  it  is  trifling 
with  a  great  subject  to  say,  in  the  same  breath,  that  Moses 
could  scarcely  have  been  even  the  author  of  the  whole  of 
the  Decalogue,  and  also  that  he  "was  regarded  as  the  great 
lawgiver,  and  all  laws  which  God  was  considered  to  have 
sanctioned  were  placed  under  his  name,  that  being  the 
regular  and  only  method  of  conferring  authority  upon  new 
enactments."  ^  The  testimony  of  a  nation  is  not  to  be  so 
lightly  set  aside :  it  is  the  work  of  criticism  to  explain 
and  account  for  tradition,  not  to  give  it  the  lie.  And  all 
the  circumstances  of  the  time  make  it  abundantly  probable 
that  the  tradition  rests  upon  some  good  foundation. 

Moses  and  his  people  came  out  of  a  country  that  had 
been  long  civilised,  and  in  wdiich  ritual  and  legislation  were 
particularly  attended  to.  They  came  into  a  land  which, 
as  we  now  know,  possessed  civilisation  and  education 
before  they  appeared  in  it,  and  they  not  only  secured  a 
footing,  but  gained  supremacy  and  maintained  it,  believ- 
ing all  the  time  that  they  were  divinely  guided.  Now, 
if  the  tribes  whom  Moses  led  had  any  unity  at  all,  if 
they  did  not  wander  aimlessly  into  Canaan,  if  they  had 
the  least  feeling  of  the  necessity  of  adhering  closely  toge- 
ther in  the  face  of  the  inhabitants  whom  they  dispossessed,^ 
such  a  unity  and  cohesion  would  be  produced  or  fostered 
by  the  possession  of  definite  laws  or  customs,  marking 
them  off  from  their  neighbours,  and  binding  them  together 
into  one.  Mere  common  belief,  especially  of  the  elemen- 
tary kind  which  modern  writers  allow  to  them,  would  not 
have  sufficed  to  separate  them  from  the  Canaanite  inhabi- 

1  Allan  Meuzies,  National  Religion,  p.  17  f.  ^  gee  Note  XXIV. 


Circumstaiices  of  the  Mosaic  Time.  337 

tants  in  such  a  way  as  to  ensure  their  ultimate  supremacy ; 
a  common  tradition  must  be  put  into  practical  shape  and 
active  operation  by  common  observances.  Even  if  the 
work  of  Moses  was  merely  the  consolidation  of  common 
observances  prevailing  prior  to  the  Mosaic  age,  these  must 
have  been  stamped  with  special  authority,  supplemented 
by  special  institutions,  and  raised  to  the  dignity  of  definite 
ordinance,  if  there  is  any  truth  at  all  in  the  unanimous 
ascription  of  law  to  Moses.  Moreover,  if  ever  there  was 
a  crisis  in  the  history  of  Israel  at  which  the  setting  up  of 
formal  institutions,  the  laying  down  of  formal  rules  for 
national  guidance,  was  naturally  to  be  expected,  it  was  at 
this  stage.  It  is  strange  indeed  that  critical  historians  of 
Israel  should  postulate  the  putting  forth  of  "  legislative 
programmes"  at  various  later  points  in  Israel's  history, 
and  should  be  so  unwilling  to  admit  the  same  for  the 
time  of  Moses.  For  just  as  individuals  in  their  early  life, 
when  moved  by  a  high  purpose,  sketch  out  for  themselves 
careers  and  lay  down  rules  of  conduct  and  principles  of 
action,  it  was  surely  the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world 
for  the  great  leader  of  Israel  to  trace  out  a  programme  of 
conduct,  and  hedge  it  round  with  precautionary  measures, 
at  a  time  when  his  nation  was  to  pass  from  a  nomadic  to 
a  more  settled  life,  and  when  they  were  liable  to  be  led 
away  by  various  temptations  from  the  simplicity  of  their 
primitive  faith.  Any  one  who  can  recall  his  plans  and 
resolutions  formed  in  early  life,  or  who  has  perchance  pre- 
served juvenile  journals  or  memoranda,  will  admit  that  in 
such  circumstances  there  is  a  natural  tendency  to  run  into 
minute  details,  which  the  exigencies  of  actual  life  after- 
wards modify  or  even  render  impracticable.  The  First 
Book  of  Discipline,  drawn  up  by  Knox  and  his  associates 
at  the  Eeformation  in  Scotland,  is  a  striking  historical 

Y 


338      AulhorUative  Institutions — tJieii-  Early  Date. 

instance  of  such  a  programme.^  So  that,  if  in  the  post- 
Mosaic  history  of  Israel  we  find  little  mention  of  many  of 
the  enactments  ascribed  to  Moses  and  the  early  Mosaic 
time,  this  need  not  surprise  us  when  we  bear  in  mind  the 
totally  new  environments  of  life  of  the  people,  and  the 
common  frailties  of  human  nature.  How  much  more  may 
be  implied  in  the  undoubted  fact  that  the  succeeding 
books  take  little  account  of  the  detailed  legislation  of  the 
Pentateuch,  we  need  not  here  consider.  Enough  has  been 
said  to  prove  in  a  general  way  that  a  certain  amount  of 
legislation  must  be  ascribed  to  Moses.  If  his  name  stands 
for  any  fact  at  all  in  the  history  of  Israel,  if  in  any  con- 
ceivable way  he  made  an  abiding  impression  upon  hii§ 
people,  it  was  by  producing,  or  by  cementing  an  already 
existing  intimate  relation  between  their  consciousness  and 
the  national  God.  This  relation  the  Biblical  writers  call 
a  covenant.''^  Critical  writers  can  hardly  avoid  using  the 
expression,  and  are  bound  to  admit  the  fact,  by  whatever 
name  it  may  be  called.  They  tell  us  that  the  compact 
amounted  to  this,  '*'  Israel  was  to  be  Jahaveh's  people,  and 
Jahaveh  Israel's  God."  Is  it  conceivable  that  at  a  period 
such  as  that  in  which  this  compact  is  placed,  at  a  time 
when  the  nation  needed  outward  props  and  helps,  a  time 
when  forms  of  worship  and  observance  were  the  most 
natural  and  unavoidable,  even  a  bare  covenant  like  this 
should  have  been  unaccompanied  with  any  ceremonial  to 
keep  it  alive  in  the  national  consciousness,  and  impress 
its  significance  upon  their  lives  ?  Can  we  believe  that 
iMoses  taught  the  people  that  the  God  whom  they  could 
not  see  was  "just  and  righteous,"  that  by  being  just  and 

1  Story's  Church  of  Scotland,  Past  and  Present.     See  particularly  vol.'. 
ii.  p.  437,  foot. 

"  See  Note  XXII.,  and  compare  above,  p.  313. 


Covenant  implies  Observances.  339 

righteous  tliey  could  best  please  Him,  that,  in  a  word, 
"  Moses  set  up  the  great  principle  that  the  true  sphere  of 
religion  is  common  life,"  ^  and  yet  that  he  left  a  people 
such  as  they  were  without  any  ordinances  of  worship,  and 
without  any  laws  for  the  guidance  of  their  daily  life  ? 
A  people,  too,  who  at  that  very  time,  and  in  the  power 
of  their  faith,  were  asserting  their  individuality !  A 
"  peculiar  "  people,  as  such  a  covenant  necessarily  made 
them,  must  have  distinctive  outward  marks;  a  "holy" 
nation,  on  the  very  lowest  ideas  of  holiness,  must  be 
separated  from  what  is  unclean ;  a  "  lioly  "  deity,  still  on 
the  most  elementary  conception  of  the  term,  must  be 
fenced  off  by  some  restrictions,  must  be  reverenced  by 
some  sacred  ceremonial.  The  very  idea  of  a  covenant,  if 
it  does  not  even  imply  sacrifice,  is  intimately  associated 
with  it  (Ps.  1.  5).  Whether  the  ceremonies  were  adapta- 
tions of  old  customs  or  new  institutions,  if  such  a  definite 
thing  as  a  covenant  stands  at  the  threshold  of  the  national 
history,  then  to  deny  to  Moses  the  organisation  of  Israel 
on  the  basis  of  definite  observances,  not  only  of  a  moral 
but  also  of  a  ceremonial  character,  is  altogether  an  excess 
of  arbitrariness,  and  leaves  the  unvarying  tradition  of  later 
time  without  any  adequate  explanation  or  support. 

But  more  precise  and  direct  proof  may  be  drawn  from 
the  prophetical  and  other  accepted  literature  of  the  time 
to  which  we  are  confining  ourselves.  We  may  not  have, ' 
indeed,  unequivocal  "  references  "  to  the  books  of  the  Law, 
or  to  the  codes  in  which  certain  laws  are  contained ;  nor 
do  we  find  full  accounts  of  the  observances  of  the  minute 
ceremonial  and  liturgical  prescriptions  of  the  Pentateuch. 
It  has  been  too  much  the  habit  of  apologetic  writers  to 
look  for  positive  citations  of  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch, 

1  Allan  Menzies,  National  Religion,  p.  24, 


340      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Date. 

or  to  argue  from  the  use  of  certain  expressions  in  pro- 
phetical or  historical  books  that  the  legislative  books  in 
which  such  or  similar  expressions  also  occur  were  then 
in  existence  and  were  thus  consciously  referred  to.^  But 
critical  writers  have  gone  to  the  other  extreme  in  arguing 
that  where  a  law  or  ordinance  is  not  mentioned  by  his- 
torical or  prophetical  authors,  it  was  not  known  to  them, 
and  therefore  had  no  existence  in  their  day.  We  shall 
have  to  test  the  value  of  this  argument  in  the  sequel ;  in 
the  meantime  we  have  to  look  at  the  testimony  borne  by 
the  prophetical  and  other  books  on  this  subject. 

From  the  whole  tone  of  the  prophetical  literature  we 
may  argue  in  a  general  way  that  there  was  in  the  times  of 
the  earliest  writing  prophets  a  universal  recognition  of  a 
well-known  norrii  or  rule  of  conduct  as  possessed  by  the 
nation,  though  sadly  dishonoured  so  far  as  concerns  its 
observance.  The  attitude  of  reproof  taken  up  by  the 
prophets,  and  the  absence  of  gainsaying  on  the  part  of 
the  people  whom  they  addressed,  prove  the  recognition  of 
some  authoritative  norm  lying  at  the  threshold  of  the 
nation's  history,  according  to  the  principles  laid  down  by 
St  Paul  (Eom.  iii.  20),  that  through  the  law  is  the  know- 
ledge of  sin,  and  (v.  13)  that  sin  is  not  imputed  where 
there  is  no  law.^  An  argument  of  this  kind  is  not  indeed 
sufficient  to  establish  the  Mosaic  origin  of  all  the  legis- 
lation of  the  Pentateuch ;  it  may  not  even  necessarily 
lead  to  the  conclusion  that  formal  codes  were  in  existence 
at  all ;  but  it  warrants  the  conclusion,  not  merely  that 
guidance  was  given  to  the  people,  from  time  to  time 
as  occasion  required,  by  prophetic  or  priestly  men,  but 

^  See  before,  chapter  v.  p.  108. 

2  So  De  Wette  reasoned  in  a  Review  of  Vatke  in  Theol.  Stud.  u.  Krit. 
for  1837,  p.  1003. 


References  of  Early  Prophets.  341 

that  some  standard  of  obedience  and  religious  observance 
was  acknowledged  as  set  up  for  permanent  appeal  and 
authority. 

But  we  can  go  much  further  than  this.  The  manner 
in  which  the  earliest  prophets  refer  to  such  an  authority 
— if  language  is  to  retain  its  ordinary  meaning  at  all — 
implies  principles  of  action  embodied  in  concrete  recog- 
nised laws.  When  Amos  threatens  Judah,  "because 
they  have  rejected  the  law  of  the  Lord,  and  have  not 
kept  His  statutes "  (Amos  ii.  4),  whether  he  is  thinking 
of  books  or  not,  he  is  certainly  thinking  of  certain  stand- 
ing principles  objectively  regarded  as  regulative  of  moral 
and  religious  life.  Law  or  Torah  may  conceivably  have 
been  at  first,  as  the  critics  assert,  no  more  than  instruc- 
tion conveyed  from  time  to  time  by  prophet  or  priest; 
and  this  matter  we  shall  consider  in  the  next  chapter. 
But  the  conjunction  of  the  word  "statutes"  leaves  no 
room  for  doubt  that  the  prophet  referred  to  an  objective 
and  concrete  norm.  Torah  may  be  teaching,  but  statutes 
are  determinate  things,  not  given  once  and  then  forgotten, 
but  set  up  as  a  standing  rule.  Moreover,  the  sins  for  which 
Israel  in  the  sequel  of  the  same  chapter  is  reproved, 
though  all  of  a  moral  kind,  are  just  such  sins  as  are  con- 
demned in  the  moral  parts  of  the  Pentateuchal  codes. 
This  prophet  has  no  doubt,  and  his  hearers  dare  not  deny, 
that  the  oppression  of  the  poor,  the  retaining  of  pledges,^ 
the  perversion  of  justice,  and  the  like,  are  violations  of 
rules  which  every  one  admitted  to  be  binding  upon  the 
nation.  It  is  particularly  to  be  noticed  that  the  sins 
for  which  Israel  and  Judah  are  threatened  are  more  pre- 
cise and  special  than  those  breaches  of  the  most  element- 
ary laws  of  humanity  against  which  the  prophetic  reproofs 
1  Amos  ii.  8.     Comp.  Exod,  xxii.  26. 


342      Authoritative  Institutions— their  Early  Date. 

of  other  nations,  Damascus,  Philistia,  Tyre,  Edom, 
Amnion,  and  Moab,  are  directed ;  and  that  it  is  precisely 
in  Judah,  where  "law"  and  "statutes"  would  be  best 
known  and  most  universally  acknowledged,  that  their 
violation  is  singled  out  for  reprobation.^ 

The  case  is  similar  with  the  prophet  Hosea.  "  They 
have  wandered  from  me,"  he  says  (vii.  13) :  "  they  have 
transgressed  my  covenant  and  trespassed  against  my 
law "  (viii.  1).  The  sins  for  which  he  reproves  the  men 
of  Israel  of  his  time  are  just  such  sins  as  the  moral  laws 
of  the  Mosaic  legislation  condemn  ;  ^  and  we  have  in  one 
passage  a  clear  indication  that  written  law,  and  that  of 
considerable  compass,  was  known  and  acknowledged  in 
his  days.  The  passage  (Hosea  viii.  12),  much  as  it  has 
been  commented  upon,  and  sought  to  be  explained  away 
in  this  connection,  cannot  be  taken  to  give  any  other 
sense  that  is  at  all  reasonable.  Whether  we  read,  with 
the  Eevised  Version,  "  though  I  write  for  him  my  law  in 
ten  thousand  precepts,"  or,  with  the  margin,  "  I  wrote  for 
him  the  ten  thousand  things  of  my  law  " — whether,  that  is 
to  say,  we  take  the  words  as  positive  or  hypothetical,  as 
referring  to  the  past,  or  to  the  present  or  future — the 
prophet  indicates  a  thing  that  his  hearers  would  regard 
as  either  done,  or  natural  to  be  done,  and  that  thing  is 
the  writing  of  law  in  a  copious  manner,  and  the  writing 
done  directly  by  divine  authority. 

The  manner  in  which  Wellhausen  gets  rid  of  this  pass^ 
age  is  exceedingly  characteristic.     He  says :  ^ — 

^  I  do  not  press  the  allusions  in  Amos  iv.  4,  5,  although  an  argument 
might  be  drawn  for  the  recognition  of  ritual  laws,  which  are  there  repre- 
sented as  exaggerated  or  perverted. — See  Bi-edenkamp,  Gesetz  u.  Pro- 
pheten,  p.  82. 

2  See  the  whole  of  Hosea  iv. 

3  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  57.  -  • 


Hosca's  Beferencc  to  Written  Law.  343 

•  "In  anotlier  passage  (viz.,  this)  we  read,  '  Epliraim  has  built  for 
nimself  many  altars,  to  sin  ;  the  altars  are  there  for  him,  to  sin. 
JIow  many  soever  my  instructions  (torothdi)  may  be,  they  are 
counted  those  of  a  stranger.'  This  text  has  had  the  unmerited 
misfortune  of  having  been  forced  to  do  service  as  a  proof  that  Hosea 
knew  of  copious  writings  similar  in  contents  to  our  Pentateuch. 
All  that  can  be  drawn  from  the  contrast,  '  instead  of  following 
my  instructions  they  offer  sacrifice'  (for  that  is  the  meaning  of 
the  passage),  is  that  the  prophet  had  never  once  dreamed  of  the 
possibility  of  cultus  being  made  the  subject  of  Jehovah's  directions." 

Here,  to  begin  with,  Wellhausen  omits  in  liis  citation 
the  significant  word  "  write,"  a  proceeding  which,  looking 
to  the  question  involved,  is,  at  the  least,  not  ingenuous ; 
for  the  word  so  rendered  cannot  be  toned  down  to  the 
general  sense  of  "prescribe."  And  then,  if  all  that  the 
passage  means  is  what  he  says,  "  instead  of  following  my 
instructions  they  offer  sacrifice,"  is  it  not  a  very  remark- 
able way  of  saying  it,  and  does  not  the  mention  of  "  writ- 
ing," in  this  subsidiary  fashion,  prove  all  the  more  strongly 
that  written  instructions  (torothdi,  and  where  are  such  to 
be  found  if  not  in  some  code  or  other?)  were  familiar' 
and  well  known  ?  Not  in  this  fashion  does  Wellhausen 
pass  by  significant  words  in  a  verse  when  these  can  be 
turned  to  the  support  of  his  theory.  The  fact  that 
"  writing  "  occurs  to  the  prophet  where  he  does  not  base 
his  main  argument  upon  it,  is  the  strong  point ;  and 
thus,  occurring  in  the  connection  in  which  it  stands, 
this  single  passage  suffices  to  establish  the  existence  of 
written  law  of  considerable  compass  at  the  time  of  Hosea. 
And  as  if  to  assure  us  that  ritual  ordinance  was  as  well 
known  as  moral  precept,  and  as  if  to  anticipate  Well- 
hausen's  remark  that  "the  prophet  never  once  dreamed 
of  the  possibility  of  cultus  being  made  the  subject  of 
Jehovah's  direction,"  the  prophet  goes  on  in  the  following 


344      Aiithoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Bate. 

verse  to  say,  "  As  for  the  sacrifices  of  mine  offerings,  they 
sacrifice  flesh  and  eat  it."  The  occurrence  of  the  single 
suffixal  mine  here,  as  in  Isaiah  i.  12,  "to  tread  my  courts," 
in  a  passage  in  which  that  prophet  is  by  modern  critics 
maintained  to  deny  the  divine  authority  of  all  sacrificial 
service,  are  much  more  convincing  proofs  to  the  contrary 
than  formal  statements  would  have  been.  Both  these 
prophets  rebuke  the  performance  of  sacrifice  as  it  went 
on  in  their  day,  and  we  need  not  wonder  at  the  sharp- 
ness of  the  rebukes.  But  at  the  same  time,  both  of  them, 
in  claiming  Temple  and  offerings  as  belonging  rightly  to 
Jahaveh,  tacitly  confirm  the  supposition,  which  is  most 
natural  in  itself,  that  Israel  up  to  their  time  had  a  law 
of  worship  which  was  undisputed,  and  that  the  Temple, 
set  apart  to  the  outward  service  of  the  national  God,  was 
provided  with  an  authoritative  order  and  ritual.^ 

These  indications  in  the  earliest  writing  prophets  are 
entirely  against  the  supposition  that  it  was  through  the 
influence  of  the  prophets  that  the  codes  of  law  came  into 
existence,  as  they  are  against  the  idea  that  law  was  re- 
garded by  them  as  a  thing  still  in  flux,  and  given  out  from 
time  to  time  by  either  prophet  or  priest  as  occasion  de- 
manded. Any  references  that  are  found  to  laws  or  ordi- 
nances in  the  prophetical  writings  are  always  of  the  nature 
of  references  to  things  existing  and  well  known  in  their 
times.  If,  in  a  few  passages,  the  law  or  laws  are  spoken 
of  as  having  been  given  by  prophetic  mediation,  it  will  be 
found  that  the  references  (as  in  Ezra  ix.  10, 11)  will  apply 
to  Moses,  who  is  regarded  as  a  prophet  and  the  leader  of 
the  prophets.2  In  any  case,  the  law  or  norm  is  regarded  aa 
a  thing  antecedent  to  the  prophets,  and  having  a  divine 
sanction  and  authority  apart  from  themselves. 

1  See  Note  XXV.  2  peut.  xviii.  15  ;  Hosea  xii.  13. 


References  in  the  Psalms.  345 

Passing  beyond  the  prophetical  books — and  we  have  only- 
glanced  at  the  earliest  of  these — we  might  find  the  same 
conclusion  confirmed  in  a  very  striking  way  by  an  exam- 
ination of  the  Psalms,  in  which  God's  law,  statutes,  and 
commandments  are  referred  to  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
suggest  positive,  well-understood  things  as  the  guides  of 
religious  conduct,  the  comfort  of  a  religious  life.  Here, 
however,  the  dates  and  authorship  of  the  compositions  are 
so  much  disputed,  that,  with  the  limitations  we  have  im- 
posed on  our  inquiry,  we  must  content  ourselves  with 
a  brief  reference.  When  all  has  been  done  that  modern 
criticism  can  do  to  relegate  the  bulk  of  the  Psalms  to  a 
late  period,  and  make  the  Psalter  the  book  of  praise  of  the 
post -exilian  synagogue,  there  still  remain,  even  in  the 
accepted  pre -exilian  Psalms,  certain  expressions  which 
cannot  be  explained  away.  Evan  so  thorough-going  a 
critic  as  Hitzig  accepted  the  latter  part  of  Psalm  xix., 
with  its  praise  of  the  law,  as  Davidic,  although  Cheyne  ^ 
has  recently  pronounced  it  to  be  late.  But  if  any  part  of 
the  Psalter  is  to  be  ascribed  to  David  at  all,  it  is  the 
1 8th  Psalm  ;  and,  not  to  speak  of  other  references  it  con- 
tains to  God's  "  ways  "  and  His  "  word,"  it  is  not  easy  to 
see  what  precise  meaning  can  be  attached  to  v.  22,  "  For 
all  His  judgments  were  before  me,  and  I  did  not  put  away 
His  statutes  from  me,"  if  there  was  no  body  of  positive 
religious  principles  of  action  existent  in  his  day.  Tlie 
"  uncritical  "  English  reader  should,  however,  be  reminded 
here  that  it  is  not  on  linguistic  considerations,  but  on  the 
grounds  of  a  higher  criticism — i.e.,  of  a  theory  of  the  re- 
ligious development — that  so  many  of  the  Psalms  are 
assigned  to  a  late  date. 

1  The  Book  of  Psalms  ;  or,  The  Praises  of  Israel.  A  new  translation 
with  commentary  (1888). 


346      Authoritative  Institutio7is — their  Early  Date. 

Let  us  next  consider  what  conclusion  is  to  Le  drawn 
from  the  undisputed  portions  of  the  books  of  Judges  and 
Samuel.  Though  they  do  not  give  us  much  information 
as  to  legal  observances,  and  are  usually  claimed  as  proving 
that  the  Deuteronomic  and  Levitical  codes  were  unknown 
at  the  periods  to  which  they  refer,  there  are  certain  in- 
dications in  them  pointing  unmistakably  to  the  conclu- 
sion that  there  was  a  recognised  order  of  some  kind  in 
those  days.  It  is  self-evident  that  the  Tabernacle  at 
Shiloh  could  not  have  existed,  nor  have  formed  the  centre 
of  worship,  without  some  recognised  ritual.  Even  should  it 
be  proved  that  the  practices  of  Eli's  sons  mentioned  in 
the  book  of  Samuel  were  inconsistent  with  the  require- 
ments of  the  Levitical  code,  this  is  no  more  than  might 
have  been  expected  from  such  men.  The  wonder  would 
be  if  the  practices  of  men  such  as  they  are  depicted  were 
in  keeping  with  any  conceivable  authoritative  rule  at  all. 
The  point,  however,  now  insisted  on  is,  that  the  Shiloh 
worship  must  have  been  invested  with  authority;  and 
therefore  that  the  idea  of  authoritative  law  for  ceremonial 
was  familiar  by  that  time.  And  so  the  sacrifices  offered 
by  Samuel,  even  should  it  be  proved  that  his  manner  of 
performing  them  contradicts  the  requirements  of  the 
codes,  imply  a  recognised  and  authoritative  law  or  rule 
of  sacrifice.  They  are  offered  to  Jahaveh  and  in  con- 
nection with  the  national  recognition  of  Him,  and  must 
therefore  have  been  regarded  as  sanctioned  and  accepted 
by  Him.  In  other  words,  at  that  time  there  was  some 
received  legislation.  So  in  the  period  of  the  Judges  there 
are  indications  that  the  people  were  acquainted  with  some 
standard  of  authority,  and  accustomed  to  conceptions  in- 
volving national  obligations. 

There  is,  for  example,  the  incidental  mention  of  the  ark 


Laiv  in  the  Period  of  the  Judges.  347 

in  Judges  XX.  27,  28.  It  is  true  this  occurs  in  a  portion 
of  the  book  which  is  pronounced  to  be  late.  But  even  if 
we  had  not  this  mention  at  all,  we  come  upon  the  ark 
again  at  the  opening  of  the  book  of  Samuel,  where  it 
is  the  centre  of  the  worship  for  the  time ;  and  we  should 
be  bound  to  explain  whence  it  came,  and  how  it  had 
acquired  this  dignity.  The  very  brevity  of  the  allusion 
however,  in  Judges,  is  proof  that  the  writer  looked 
upon  the  ark  as  a  national  institution ;  and  if  the  state- 
ment has  any  historic  value  at  all,  it  proves  the  pos- 
session by  Israel  of  some  outward  bond  of  religious  life. 
In  other  words,  they  were  not  at  this  time  merely  a  num- 
ber of  isolated  tribes,  related  in  some  loose  way  to  one 
another,  and  owning  one  common  tribal  god  ;  but  they  had, 
previous  to  this  time,  been  accustomed  to  regard  them- 
selves as  one  people,  and,  as  a  mark  of  their  unity,  had 
some  form  of  outward  worship.  We  must  therefore  go 
back  to  the  time  preceding  the  Judges  for  some  account  of 
this  feature  of  their  religious  life ;  and  no  Biblical  writer 
gives  the  least  hint  of  the  existence  of  anything  like  it  in 
the  early  patriarchal  age.  The  reference  to  Phinehas,  the 
son  of  Eleazar,  the  son  of  Aaron,  who  ministers  at  the  ark, 
indicating  a  hereditary  priesthood  in  the  family  of  Aaron, 
of  course  does  not  suit  the  modern  theory.  It  is  simply 
called  by  Wellhausen  ^  "  a  gloss  which  forms  a  very  awk- 
ward interruption."  Much  more  to  his  purpose  is  the 
statement  (in  xviii.  30)  that  Jonathan,  the  son  of  Ger- 
shom,  the  son  of  Moses,  became  a  priest  to  the  Danites, 
as  a  proof  that  there  was  no  regular  Aaronic  priesthood 
— although  it  is  added  in  the  next  verse  that  "  Micah's 
graven  image "  was  at  Dan  "  all  the  time  that  the  house 
of  God  was  in  Shiloh."     At  all  events  we  have  here,  iu 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  237. 


348      Authoritative  Institutions — tJieii-  Early  Date. 
t 
'  these  two  incidental  allusions,  sufficient  to  carry  us  back 

to  a  period  antecedent  to  the  Judges  for  an  explanation  of 
the  religious  position  of  the  people  at  that  time.  The 
ark  of  God,  a  priesthood,  whether  hereditary  or  not,  a 
house  of  God  at  Shiloh — all  these  imply  much  more  than 
they  express.  The  priest  must  have  a  function,  the  house 
of  God  some  ritual,  an  ark  some  history.  These  things 
could  not  have  been  borrowed  from  the  Canaanites  the 
moment  the  conquest  was  secured.  Even  such  matters  as 
the  distinction  of  clean  and  unclean  animals,  the  pro- 
hibition of  certain  foods,  and  the  treatment  of  lepers, 
which  may,  and  probably  do,  go  back  to  pre-Mosaic  times, 
imply  regulation,  ceremony,  and,  in  many  cases,  the  offer- 
ing of  sacrifices.  All  these,  however,  are  just  the  things 
that  would  be  taken  under  the  sanction  of  the  covenant, 
which  was  to  set  apart  a  holy  people,  and  made  matters  of 
prescription  by  a  legislative  founder  like  Moses.  For  it  is 
always  to  be  remembered  that  by  this  time  certainly  the 
Israelite  tribes  were  in  possession  of  the  Jahaveh  religion. 
Tliese  outward  arrangements,  whatever  their  origin,  were 
associated  with  their  worship  of  Him  as  their  only  God ; 
and  as  that  religion,  on  any  explanation  of  it,  was  the  char- 
acteristic mark  separating  them  from  their  neighbours,  it 
is  surely  most  extraordinary  to  suppose  that  the  outward 
concomitants  of  the  religion  should  present  no  difference 
from  the  worship  of  the  peoples  around  them. 

Again,  it  is  maintained  by  Wellhausen  and  his  school 
that  the  tribe  of  Levi  was  originally  a  secular  tribe  like 
the  others,  and  associated  with  the  kindred  tribe  of  Simeon, 
whose  fate  it  shared  in  being  dispersed  in  Israel ;  and  it 
is  maintained  that  the  Levitical  guild  was  a  growth  of 
much  later  time,  when  priestly  development  had  far  ad- 
vanced.    Now  the  story  of  Micah  in  the  book  of  Judges  is 


The  Levites  in  the  Time  of  the  Judges,  349 

inuch  relied  on  by  the  critics  for  the  state  of  religion  ^  at 
this  early  period.  In  that  story  (chap,  xvii.)  a  young  man 
of  the  family  of  Judah,  who  was  a  Levite,  departs  from 
Bethlehem-Judah  to  sojourn  where  he  could  find  a  place, 
and  comes  to  Micah,  who  hires  him  to  be  his  priest. 
It  is  added  :  "  Then  said  Micah,  Now  know  I  that  the 
Lord  will  do  me  good,  seeing  I  have  a  Levite  to  my 
priest."  And  again,  in  the  19th  chapter,  which  is  allowed 
to  contain  archaic  matter,  we  find  a  certain  Levite  so- 
journing on  the  farther  side  of  the  hill -country  of 
Ephraim.  Now  it  might  be  said,  these  are  simply 
members  of  the  extinct  tribe  of  Levi.  But  it  does  seem 
remarkable  tliat  in  both  cases  they  should  be  seen  sojourn- 
ing— moving  about,  in  fact — as  the  Levites,  according  to 
the  legal  requirement,  might  be  expected  to  do.  And 
more  remarkable  is  the  fact  that  they  are  specially  called 
Levites — though  why  the  tribal  designation  is  kept  up 
when  the  tribe  is  absorbed  is  not  clear ;  and  most  remark- 
able of  all  that  Micah,  steeped  to  the  lips  in  superstition, 
should  believe  that  good  was  sure  to  come  to  him  because 
he  had  a  Levite  for  a  priest.  On  the  theory  of  the  Old 
Testament  writers,  the  fact,  notwithstanding  all  the  sur- 
rounding superstition,  is  easily  explained.  There  was  a 
tribe  of  Levi  without  territory,  with  a  priestly  or  qicasi- 
priestly  function,  the  members  of  wliich  were  held  in 
repute  on  tliat  account.  On  the  new  theory,  we  meet 
with  a  feature  of  the  life  of  that  rude  age  that  calls  for 
an  explanation,  and  fails  to  find  it.  To  my  mind  such 
an  incidental  notice  is  a  very  strong  corroboration  of  the 
history  which  declares  that  a  tribe  of  Levi  was  set  apart 
for  sacred  functions ;  and  considering  the  age  in  which  the 
events  occurred,  a  more  convincing  proof  of  the  accuracy 

^  See  chapter  ix.  p.  231, 


350      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Date. 

of  the  book  than  an  elaborate  attempt  to  show  that  all 
the  requirements  of  the  Levitical  law  were  in  force.  The 
discovery  of  a  fact  like  this,  in  the  darkness  and  igno- 
rance of  those  times,  sends  ns  back  to  a  time  antecedent 
to  the  Judges  for  the  proper  basis  of  the  religious  consti- 
tution of  Israel. 

The  references  we  thus  find  in  undoubtedly  early  com- 
positions, though  not  perhaps  numerous,  yet  just  because 
they  are  incidental  and  indirect,  establish  a  very  strong 
presumption  that  the  pre-prophetic  religion  was  backed 
up  by  a  well-recognised  system  of  positive  enactments, 
and  account  for  the  persistent  ascription  of  code  after 
code  to  Moses.  There  are  other  considerations,  pointing 
in  the  same  direction,  which  should  not  be  left  out  of 
account.  There  is,  e.g.,  the  remarkable  fact  that,  during 
the  whole  of  the  regal  period,  we  never  hear  of  the  kings 
making  laws,  while  there  is  a  constant  reference  to  law, 
in  some  sense  or  other,  as  an  authoritative  thing  in  the 
nation.  The  solitary  instance  that  is  recorded  (1  Sam. 
XXX.  25)  only  proves  the  rule.  Again,  there  is  the  undis- 
puted fact  that  a  recognised  priesthood  existed  in  Israel 
from  very  early  times.  It  is  hardly  conceivable  that  such 
an  order  should  have  existed  without  formal  regulation 
and  prescribed  functions;  and  as  the  critical  historians 
refer  to  priestly  circles  the  very  earliest  collection  of  laws, 
contained  in  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  and  admit  that  the 
priests  always  appealed  to  the  authority  of  Moses,  the 
inference  does  not  seem  unwarranted  that  a  priestly  law, 
of  some  extent  and  of  a  definite  description,  formed  part  of 
the  constitution  given  to  Israel  by  the  great  lawgiver. 

It  is,  it  must  be  confessed,  somewhat  remarkable  that 
so  little  is  said  of  Moses  by  the  earlier  prophets,  though 
some  have  overstated  the  matter,  and  have  drawn  from  it 


References  to  Moses  hy  Prophets.  351 

a  conclusion  which  is  quite  unwarranted.  Ghillany/  e.g., 
mentions  it  as  a  circumstance  hitherto  unnoticed,  that  the 
name  of  Moses,  except  in  the  post-exilic  Malachi  (iv.  4) 
and  Daniel  (ix.  11,  13),  does  not  occur  in  any  of  the  pro- 
phets ;  or  at  least  he  had  not  discovered  the  name  anywhere 
else  in  the  prophets — not  even  in  Ezekiel.  Elsewhere  ^  he 
says  that  Moses,  so  renowned  among  the  Jews  after  the 
captivity,  is  only  named  five  times  altogether  in  tlie  whole 
prophetical  literature,  and  that  of  all  the  prophets  who 
lived  before  B.C.  622,  the  year  in  which  the  so-called 
Mosaic  law  was  found  in  the  Temple,  not  one  mentions 
Moses  as  a  lawgiver  or  appeals  to  his  authority.  Only  in 
one  of  the  prophets  before  that  period  (Micah  vi.  4)  is 
there  found  an  exception ;  and  this  passage  is  declared  to 
be  an  interpolation.  It  is  clear,  however,  that  Hosea, 
though  he  does  not  name  him,  directly  refers  to  Moses 
when  he  says  that  by  a  "prophet"  the  Lord  brought 
Israel  out  of  Egypt  (xii.  13).  Jeremiah  also  must  have 
had  Moses  in  mind  when  he  said,  "  Since  the  day  that 
your  fathers  came  forth  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt  unto 
this  day,  I  have  even  sent  unto  you  all  my  servants  the 
prophets,  daily  rising  up  early  and  sending  them  "  (Jer. 
vii.  25,  &c.)  Moreover,  in  Isa.  Ixiii.  11,  Moses  is  expressly 
named.  The  inference,  however,  from  such  texts,  is  rather 
against  than  in  favour  of  the  modern  theory.^  So  pre- 
carious is  the  argument  from  silence,  that  one  is  almost 
tempted  to  maintain  the  paradox  that  the  things  which 
are  least  mentioned  were  the  most  familiar.  The  historical 
fact  stands  undoubted,  that,  from  first  to  last,  legislation 

^  Die  Menschenopfer  der  alten  Hebriier,  p.  27. 
2  Theologische  Brief e  von  Richard  von  der  Aim,  vol.  i.  p.  179  ff. 
^  Konig,  Hauptprobleme,  p.  16  ;  Delitzsch,  Comm.  on  Genesis,  Eug^. 
trans.,  vol.  i,  p.  11  f. 


'352      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Early  Date. 

was  ascribed  to  Moses ;  and  if  the  critics  should  succeed 
in  making  out  from  this  silence  that  the  earlier  prophets 
knew  little  or  nothing  of  Moses,  then  it  is  all  the  more 
difficult  to  explain  how  a  person  so  unknown  and  undis- 
tinguished should  have  had  invariably  the  immense  work 
of  legislation  ascribed  to  him.  Much  rather  should  we  say 
that  the  work  of  Moses  was  so  familiar  to  the  national 
mind  that  there  was  no  need  to  mention  him  by  name ;  a 
mere  reference  to  Egypt  or  Sinai  was  to  the  popular  mind 
more  than  a  verbal  mention.  We  know  how  in  other 
Scriptures,  which  are  not  from  the  hands  of  prophets,  the 
highest  place  is  assigned  to  Moses  as  an  organ  of  divine 
revelation  (Exod.  xxxiii.  11 ;  Num.  xii.  6-8 ;  Deut.  xxxiv. 
10).  Such  passages  are  surer  indications  than  express 
mention  of  his  name,  that  Moses  was  in  the  estimation 
and  recollection  of  the  nation  "  the  most  exalted  figure  in 
all  primitive  history";^  and  account  satisfactorily  for 
the  constant  ascription  to  him  of  the  legislation.  Still 
we  come  back  to  what  is  better  than  verbal  references, 
the  underlying  assumption  in  the  earlier  prophets  and 
extra-legislative  literature,  that  there  was  an  objective 
and  undisputed  norm,  to  whose  authority  prophets, 
priests,  and  people  alike  acknowledged  submission.  The 
question,  therefore,  which  now  presses  itself  upon  us  for 
solution  is.  What  was  the  law  or  norm  which  is  thus 
referred  to? 

^  Ranke,  Universal  History,  translated  by  Prothero,  p.  31. 


353 


CHAPTER     XIV. 

AUTHORITATIVE  INSTITUTIONS — THEIR  RELIGIOUS  BASIS. 

Brief  summary  of  leading  positions  of  the  modern  school — Examination  of 
main  points:  (1)  Oral  law  before  written  law;  references  to  lata  of 
priests  and  prophets  ;  theory  of  law  orally  given  from  time  to  time 
doion  to  reign  of  Josiah  shown  to  be  untenable :  (2)  Origin  of  feasts 
and  worship  according  to  the  theory — Natural  and  agricultural  basis, 
centralisation,  fixity,  historical  reference — TJie  theory  criticised :  (a) 
the  mere  joyousness  of  a  nature  feast  made  too  much  of ;  the  basket  of 
fruits ;  (b)  exaggerated  importance  of  idea  of  centralisation  ;  (c)  fail- 
ure to  show  transition  from  agricultural  to  religious  feasts,  and  to  ex- 
plain the  historical  reference — The  Passover  a  glaring  instance. 

In  the  preceding  chapter  we  have  seen  reasons  for  ascrib- 
ing to  Moses  a  definite  and  authoritative  system  of  law. 
If  the  references  of  the  prophetical  and  other  books  have 
been  rightly  interpreted,  we  should  expect  to  find  some- 
where d  code  or  codes  of  laws  regulating  the  life  and 
worship  of  Jahaveh's  people ;  and  as  we  know  of  no  other 
laws  than  those  contained  in  the  law-books,  there  is  a 
primary  presumption  that  these  are  the  laws  in  question. 
If  not,  the  question  is,  Where  are  the  laws,  or  what  has 
become  of  them  ?  or,  put  otherwise.  What  are  the  laws 
which  these  books  contain  ? 

The  account  the  modern  theory  gives  of  the  matter  is 
something  to  the  following  effect:   Moses  neither  wrote 

z 


354      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Religious  Basis. 

I  nor  ordained  an  elaborate  body  of  laws.  Law  (Torali) 
was  at  first  and  for  a  long  time  an  oral  system  of  instruc- 
tion, which  at  definite  and  comparatively  late  periods  was 
codified  for  special  purposes.  Nor  are  the  religious  rites 
and  ceremonies  that  claim  to  have  been  given  by  Moses 
of  Mosaic  origin,  but  survivals  of  old  customary  obser- 
vances, principally  connected  with  the  agricultural  year, 
and  transformed  at  a  late  time  into  ceremonies  of  a  more 
national  and  religious  nature.  This  view,  it  is  claimed,  is 
not  only  consistent  with  the  statements  of  the  prophets, 
but  is  the  only  one  in  harmony  with  the  history.  To  the 
main  points  here  stated  we  now  turn  our  attention. 

(1.)  In  the  first  place,  we  are  told  there  was  an  oral  law 
before  there  was  a  written  law.  The  priests  had  as  their 
function  to  teach  the  people ;  the  prophets  also  were 
teachers ;  but  the  law  or  teaching  communicated  by  both 
was  an  oral  thing,  given  forth  as  occasion  demanded,  at 
the  request  of  individuals  who  came  to  the  priests  for 
direction,  or  spontaneously  by  the  prophets  when  they 
Were  moved  to  give  their  testimony.  The  priestly  Torali 
was  a  more  regular  thing;  the  prophetic,  sporadic  and 
occasional ;  and  there  was  this  difference,  that  the  priest 
rested  upon  tradition,  whereas  the  prophet  spoke  by  his 
own  authority,  or  rather  in  the  name  of  God  directly. 
i"The  priests  derived  their  Torah  from  Moses;  they 
claimed  only  to  preserve  and  guard  what  Moses  had 
left  (Deut.  xxxiii.  4,  9  seq.)  He  counted  as  their  ancestor 
(xxxiii.  8;  Judges  xviii.  30);  his  father-in-law  is  the 
priest  of  Midian  at  Mount  Sinai,  as  Jehovah  also  is 
derived  in  a  certain  sense  from  the  older  deity  of  Sinai."  ^ 
When  priests  and  prophets  are  mentioned  together,  "  the 
priests  take  precedence  of  the  prophets.  .  .  .  For  this  reason, 

1  \Vellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  396. 


Meaning  of  the  Word  Tor  ah.  355 

that  they  take  their  stand  so  entirely  on  the  tradition  and 
depend  on  it,  their  claim  to  have  Moses  for  their  father, 
the  beginner  and  founder  of  their  tradition,  is  in  itself  the 
better  founded  of  the  two."  ^  "  The  prophets  have  notori- 
ously no  father  (1  Sam.  x.  12).  .  .  .  We  have  thus  on 
the  one  side  the  tradition  of  a  class,  which  suffices  for  the 
occasions  of  ordinary  life ;  and  on  the  other,  the  inspiration 
of  awakened  individuals,  stirred  up  by  occasions  which  are 
more  than  ordinary."  ^  The  priestly  Torah  was  chiefly 
confined  to  law  and  morals,  though  the  priests  "  also  gave 
ritual  instruction  {e.g.,  regarding  cleanness  and  unclean- 
ness)."  In  pre-exilian  antiquity,  however,  "  the  priests' 
own  praxis  [at  the  altar]  never  constituted  the  contents 
of  the  Torah,"  which  "  always  consisted  of  instructions  to 
the  laity."  3 

That  the  word  Torah  is  applied  to  oral  instruction,  and 
means  originally,  like  the  corresponding  words  ht^axn  and 
doctrina,  simply  teaching,  need  not  be  disputed.  It  seems 
to  have  the  primary  idea  of  throwing  out  the  hand  in  the 
gesture  of  guidance  or  direction^  (which  would  perhaps 
be  a  better  rendering),  and  it  is  found  in  this  general 
sense  in  Prov.  i.  8,  iii.  1,  iv.  2 :  "  The  instruction  of 
thy  father,  and  the  law  of  thy  mother;"  "my  law."     So 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  397. 

2  Ibid.,  p.  398.  3  ibi(j_^  p^  59^  note. 

^  There  seems,  however,  no  reason  to  conclude  that  Torah,  from  a  verb 
"  to  throw,"  originally  referred  to  the  casting  down  of  some  kind  of  dice, 
as,  e.g.,  Urim  and  Thummim,  to  determine  a  course  of  action,  as  Well- 
hausen (Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  394)  supposes.  There  is  no  instance  of  decision 
by  the  Urim  and  Thummim  being  called  Torah  ;  and  Wellhausen  himself 
strenuously  maintains  an  oral  Torah  by  the  prophets,  which  could  not 
have  been  of  this  description.  Stade,  of  course,  traces  back  the  oracle 
and  the  use  of  the  lot  to  fetishistic  and  animistic  practices,  and  the  priest 
to  the  soothsayer.  The  prophet  who,  at  a  later  time,  contended  with  the 
mechanical  priestcraft,  was  also  a  survival  of  the  primitive  "seer." — Ge- 
schichte,  vol.  i.  pp.  468-476. 


356      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Religious  Basis. 

that  any  advice,  for  the  purpose  of  guidance  (for  that  is 
always  implied),  is  naturally  denoted  by  it ;  and  the  guid- 
ance or  instruction  of  priests  or  prophets,  who  were  the 
religious  guides  or  instructors  of  the  people,  is,  as  a  mat- 
ter of  course,  denoted  by  one  common  word,  Torah.  Ex- 
amples of  the  use  of  the  word  to  express  prophetic  teach- 
ing are  found  in  Isaiah,  who  says :  "  Hear  the  word  of  the 
Lord,  ye  rulers  of  Sodom ;  attend  to  the  law  of  our  God, 
ye  people  of  Gomorrah  "  (i.  10),  where  he  is  clearly  refer- 
ring to  his  own  teaching ;  and  even  if  we  suppose  a  ref- 
erence to  a  written  law,  it  could  only  be  to  the  substance 
and  not  the  letter  of  it  that  he  directed  attention.  So 
when  he  says,  "  Bind  up  the  testimony,  seal  the  law  among 
my  disciples"  (viii.  16),  though  he  is  speaking  of  some- 
thing objective,  positive,  and  authoritative,  it  is  most 
natural  to  see  a  reference  to  what  he  had  just  said  or  was 
about  to  say.  Probably  also  a  general  sense  should  be 
given  to  the  word  in  xxx.  9,  "  This  is  a  rebellious  people, 
lying  children,  children  that  will  not  hear  the  law  of  the 
Lord."  Again  we  have  mention  of  a  specific  pnestly  Torah 
in  the  Blessing  of  Moses,  one  of  the  oldest  pieces  of  Heb- 
rew literature,  where  it  is  said  of  the  tribe  of  Levi,  "  They 
shall  teach  Jacob  Thy  judgments,  and  Israel  Thy  law: 
they  shall  put  incense  before  Thee,  and  whole  burnt-offer- 
ings upon  Thine  altar  "  (Deut.  xxxiii.  10).  Whatever  else 
we  may  learn  from  the  verse,  the  function  of  the  Levite 
to  teach  is  clearly  stated,  and  this  means  a  course  of  in- 
struction or  acts  of  instruction  to  the  people.  That  a 
distinction  was  drawn  between  the  teaching  of  the  priests 
and  that  of  the  prophets,  we  may  also  conclude  from 
such  a  passage  as  Micah  iii.  11,  "The  heads  thereof 
judge  for  reward,  and  the  priests  thereof  teach  for  hire, 
and  the  prophets  divine  for  money."     A  similar  distinc- 


Prophetical  ami  Priestly  Tor  ah.  357 

tion,  showing  the  existence  of  a  priestly  law,  is  found  in 
Jeremiah,  "  The  law  shall  not  perish  from  the  priest,  nor 
counsel  from  the  wise,  nor  the  word  from  the  prophet " 
(xviii.  18);  in  Lamentations  (ii.  9),  "Her  king  and  her 
princes  are  among  the  nations  where  law  is  not ;  yea,  her 
prophets  find  no  vision  from  the  Lord ; "  and  in  Ezekiel, 
"  The  law  shall  perish  from  the  priest,  and  counsel  from 
the  ancients"  (vii.  26);  "her  priests  have  violated  my 
law,  and  profaned  mine  holy  things,"  &c.  (xxii.  26). 
In  other  passages,  again,  "law"  seems  to  be  used  as 
synonymous  with  "  the  word  of  the  Lord,"  generally  to 
express  the  whole  of  the  truth  of  revelation,  as  in  Isaiah 
ii.  3,  V.  24,  xlii.  4 ;  Micah  iv.  2 ;  and  perhaps  Amos  ii.  4, 
and  Hosea  viii.  1. 

While,  however,  these  distinctions  are  noticeable,  the 
inferences  drawn  from  them  are  not  at  all  warrant- 
able. The  general  use  of  the  word  to  denote  divine 
revelation  of  truth  as  a  whole  implies  a  unity  in  that 
truth,  and  to  this  extent  it  is  true  that  even  the  priestly 
Torah  was  mainly,  or  we  should  rather  say,  fundamentally, 
of  a  moral  character ;  although  we  have  seen  in  the  last 
chapter  good  reason  for  concluding  that  the  prophets  I 
knew  of  and  recognised  a  ritual  law  as  well.  But  the  ■ 
main  point  now  in  hand  is  the  alleged  long  existence 
of  oral  apart  from  and  antecedent  to  written  Torah ; 
and  it  may  be  maintained,  even  on  the  ground  of  the 
passages  just  cited,  that  the  inference  is  too  bold.  Let  us 
make  the  supposition  demanded  by  Wellhausen,  that  the 
priests  had  the  practice  of  giving  oral  decisions  as  occasion 
arose.  Still,  the  question  arises.  Did  the  priests  decide 
individual  cases  according  to  their  individual  judgment  ? 
and  if  not,  what  precisely  were  the  guiding  principles  on 
which  they  acted  ?     It  is  hardly  conceivable  that  such  in- 


358      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Heligious  Basis. 

struction,  if  regularly  given,  np  to  a  comparatively  late 
time,  should  not  have  assumed,  in  practice,  some  concrete 
expression.  The  sentences  uttered  on  various  and  re- 
curring occasions  must,  at  all  events,  have  been  regarded 
as  self- consistent,  and  of  concordant  tenor,  before  they 
could  be  spoken  of  under  this  comprehensive  term  of 
Torah  or  instruction.  Then  we  have  to  note  particularly 
how  it  is  admitted  that  the  oral  priestly  Torah,  whicli  is 
thus  assumed,  always  claims  for  itself,  not  only  high 
antiquity,  but  Mosaic  sanction.  And,  since  even  the 
priestly  Torah  is  represented  as  a  unity,  we  are  led  to 
inquire  whether  there  was  not  some  positive  guide  in 
the  form  of  typical  decisions  which  would  account  for 
so  firm  a  tradition,  and  give  some  kind  of  uniformity 
to  the  oral  sentences.  If  an  oral  teaching  by  the  prophets 
did  not  prevent  them  from  writing  down  their  discourses, 
why  should  the  priests,  who  had  a  teaching  of  a  much 
more  detailed  and  technical  kind  to  convey,  not  have 
had  a  written  Torah  for  their  guidance  ?  Wellhausen 
feels  the  force  of  this,  for  he  says  it  might  be  sup- 
posed that,  even  if  Deuteronomy  and  the  Levitical  Code 
are  late,  the  Jehovistic  legislation  contained  in  the  book 
of  the  Covenant  (Exod.  xx.-xxiii.,  xxxiv.)  "  might  be  re- 
garded as  the  document  which  formed  the  starting-point 
of  the  religious  history  of  Israel.  And  this  position  is  in 
fact  generally  claimed  for  it."  ^  It  belongs,  however,  he 
says,  to  a  period  much  later  than  the  active  oral  Torah 
of  the  priests,  and  he  reduces  the  Mosaic  elements  in  it 
to  the  barest  minimum,  scarcely  even  admitting  the 
Mosaic  origin  of  the  Decalogue. 

So  that  the  alleged  oral  Torah,  on  the  hypothesis,  rests 
upon  nothing  but  immemorial  custom,  eacli  decision  as  it 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  392. 


Moses  hearing  Cases  in  Person.  359 

was  given  constituting  a  Torali  or  law  to  meet  the  case  in 
hand.  That  this  was  the  way  the  law  arose,  and  not  by 
the  promulgation  of  a  set  of  statutes,  is  said  to  be  indicated 
by  a  chapter  in  Exodus  (xviii.),  which  represents  Moses 
himself  as  sitting  hearing  cases  in  person,  and  deciding 
each  case  on  its  own  merits.  But  this  very  chapter,  so 
mucli  relied  upon,  seems  itself  to  draw  the  distinction 
between  legislation  and  administration.  Moses  is  repre- 
sented as  discharging  both  functions ;  but  the  chapter 
tells  how  he  was  advised  to  separate  them.  He  set 
over  the  people  able  men,  who  were  to  judge  the  people 
in  small  matters,  reserving  the  "great  matters"  for  his 
own  decision.  If  the  critics  are  prepared  to  take  this 
chapter  as  a  plain  historical  statement,  then  we  get  a 
positive  starting-point  for  Mosaic  law,  and  that,  too,  of  a 
pretty  comprehensive  compass.  For  if  the  decisions  on 
great  matters  were  given  by  Moses,  we  have  Mosaic 
legislation,  since  his  sentences  were  given  (presumably) 
on  new  cases  or  were  regulations  of  older  usages ;  and 
the  small  matters  doubtless  were  controlled  by  precedents 
set  by  him.  There  is  no  reason  to  assume  that  such 
decisions  as  were  given  by  Moses  and  his  assessors  re- 
mained unwritten,  or  in  flux,  till  the  time  to  which 
the  book  of  the  Covenant  is  brought  down ;  and  it  is 
to  be  noted  how  care  was  taken,  by  the  appointment 
of  capable  judges  and  by  the  teaching  of  the  "statutes," 
that  uniformity  and  consistency  should  be  maintained. 
Unless,  indeed,  there  was  some  guiding  rule,  the  decisions 
could  not  have  remained  consistent  with  themselves,  and 
could  never  have  assumed  a  shape  in  which,  collectively, 
they  would  have  acquired  respect.  So  in  the  passage 
already  cited  from  the  Blessing  of  Moses,  where  it  is 
described  as  the  function  of  Levi  to  teach  the  people  the 


360      Authoritative  Institutions     their  Beligious  Basis. 

law,  there  is  presumably  something  definite  and  positive 
to  be  taught ;  just  as  the  second  half  of  the  verse  speaks 
of  the  offerings  which  they  had  to  present  on  the  altar. 
Wellhausen's  position,  so  confidently  assumed,  that  the 
"  teaching  is  only  thought  of  as  the  action  of  the  teacher  " 
— if  the  teaching  is  to  have  any  consistency  at  all — seems 
to  me  only  conceivable  on  the  supposition  of  a  guidance 
of  the  teacher,  an  inspiration,  in  fact,  of  a  kind  that  I 
fancy  Wellhausen  would  be  the  last  to  admit.  It  is,  be- 
sides, flatly  contradicted  by  such  a  passage  as  Hosea  iv.  6, 
where  the  priest  is  reproached  (according  to  the  common 
interpretation  which  applies  the  passage  to  the  priestly 
class)  for  having  forgotten  the  law  of  God,  as  indeed  by  all 
the  passages  which  reprove  the  priests  for  unfaithfulness. 
If  everything  taught  by  the  priest  was  Torah,  with  no 
guiding  norm,  such  reproofs  were  out  of  place.  Yet  it  is 
to  be  observed  that  the  prophets,  whatever  they  may  say 
about  the  priests  as  a  class,  always  speak  of  their  Torah 
as  a  thing  of  unquestioned  authority ;  and  they  were  not 
the  men  to  speak  tlms  of  the  haphazard  decisions  on  "  law 
and  morals  "  given  by  a  class  which  was  too  often  both  law- 
less and  immoral.  Looking  at  it  from  any  possible  point 
of  view,  in  the  face  of  this  persistent  ascription  of  law  to 
Moses,  we  are  bound  to  assume  something  positive  and 
plain,  of  such  a  character  that  a  priesthood,  often  ignorant 
and  corrupt,  would  be  guided  to  give  forth  sentences  that 
prophetic  men  could  speak  of  with  respect.  To  say  noth- 
ing of  the  intricate  cases  of  ceremonial  cleanness  and  de- 
filement, which  Wellhausen  admits  constituted  an  element 
of  the  Torah,  there  were  also  "  law  and  morals,"  as  he  tells 
as,  and  there  must  have  been  countless  cases  of  casuistry 
and  jurisprudence  calling  for  decision  at  the  mouth  of 
these  men,  from  whom  there  was  no  appeal ;    and   the 


The  Priests'  own  Praxis  at  the  Altar.  361 

whole,  when  collected,  forms,  we  are  to  suppose,  the  legis- 
lation on  these  subjects  which  afterwards  became  syste- 
matised  into  codes.  Moreover,  there  were  the  matters 
relating  to  the  right  performance  of  priestly  functions  and 
the  proper  observance  of  sacred  ceremonies.  Wellhausen 
indeed  says  positively — although  on  no  positive  evidence — 
that  "  the  priests'  own  praxis  [at  the  altar]  never  consti- 
tuted, in  pre-exilian  antiquity,  the  contents  of  the  Torah."  ^ 
Yet,  considering  the  punctilious  observance  that  must 
have  been  required  in  such  services,  and  the  jealousy  of 
a  priestly  class  to  maintain  forms  in  their  rigour,  one 
would  have  expected  that  just  in  mutters  of  this  kind  the 
Torah,  whether  oral  or  written,  would  be  most  definite. 
Although  there  was  no  need  for  the  priests  to  instruct 
the  laity  in  these  matters,  they  were  of  such  a  kind  as 
would  suggest  the  writing  of  them  down  in  longer  or 
shorter  collections  to  aid  the  memory  of  the  priests  them- 
selves, to  guide  the  partially  initiated,  and  to  secure  ac- 
curate preservation.  Many  of  the  laws  of  Leviticus,  in 
fact,  to  an  ordinary  reader,  have  the  appearance  of  "  mem- 
oranda "  which  might  be  ready  at  hand  for  instruction 
in  such  functions.  The  insistence  on  the  authority  of 
law,  combined  with  the  reproof  of  the  priesthood,  can 
thus  have  but  one  meaning — viz.,  that  the  priests  were 
in  possession  of  an  ancient  authoritative  norm,  accord- 
ing to  which  even  ignorant  men  with  technical  training 
could  have  no  excuse  for  going  astray. 

The  priests'  function,  indeed,  was  to  give  instruction  to 
the  people,  but  the  fact  that  they  did  so  orally  is  no  proof 
that  there  was  no  written  or  objective  standard  by  which 
they  taught.  Nay,  we  have  positive  proof  to  the  contrary. 
Both  in  Haggai  (ii.  11)  and  in  Malachi  (ii.  7),  by  whose 

^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  59,  note. 


362      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Bdigious  Basis. 

time  certainly  the  law  was  codified  and  recognised,  there 
is  mention  of  the  oral  teaching  of  the  priests.  And  if 
oral  instruction  was  necessary  at  that  time,  though  co- 
existent with  a  written  law,  we  are  not  bound  to  conclude 
when  Micah,  for  example,  speaks  of  the  priests  of  his  time 
teaching  for  hire  (Micah  iii.  11),  that  they  drew  upon  a 
tradition  which  was  entirely  in  their  own  possession. 
We  have  still  Christian  pastors  and  teachers,  although 
the  Scriptures  are  in  every  one's  hands,  and  expounders 
of  the  law  would  be  more  necessary  in  ages  when  print- 
ing was  unknown  and  books  rare.  Indeed,  if  at  a  late 
time,  when  the  law  was  fully  codified,  there  was  need  of 
oral  exposition,  much  more  would  oral  instruction  require 
a  definite  basis  at  the  earlier  periods  when  priests  and 
people  were  so  tempted  to  fall  into  corruption.  Yet 
during  even  tlie  worst  times  the  prophets  have  no  doubt 
of  the  purity  and  fixity  of  the  priestly  Torah.  In  speak- 
ing of  the  instruction  of  the  priests,  they  regard  it  as  a 
thing  superior  to  and  binding  upon  the  class  and  the 
people.  "  Sentences,"  "  judgments,"  "  statutes  "  could  have 
had  no  coherency  apart  from  a  standard.  It  need  not  of 
course  be  concluded,  that  wherever  "  law  "  occurs  there  is 
a  reference  to  the  Pentateuch  as  a  wliole,  or  to  any  look 
whatever  in  the  modern  sense.  But  the  alternative  is  not, 
as  seems  to  be  hastily  assumed,  that  there  was  no  concrete 
law  nor  written  code  of  guidance — nothing,  in  short,  but 
oral  law,  still  in  process  of  being  delivered.  Such  a  sup- 
position is  in  itself  hardly  conceivable,  considering  the 
conditions  of  the  nation  and  the  long  period  over  which 
this  oral  law  is  said  to  extend ;  nor  is  it  supported  by  an 
unforced  exegesis  of  the  prophetic  utterances. 

(2.)  We  have  next  to  consider  the  assertion  that  the 
ceremonies  and  observances  of  the  reli(?ion  of  Israel  were 


Naturalistic  Basis  of  Feasts.  363 

not  matters  of  divine  authoritative  appointment  at  first, 
but  were  the  growth  of  custom. 

"  In  the  early  days/'  says  Wellhausen,  "  worship  arose  out  of  the 
midst  of  ordinary  life,  and  was  in  most  intimate  and  manifold  con- 
nection witli  it.  A  sacrifice  was  a  meal— a  fact  showing  how  remote 
was  the  idea  of  antithesis  between  spiritual  earnestness  and  pecular 
joyousness.  .  .  .  Year  after  year  the  return  of  vintage,  corn- 
harvest,  and  sheep-shearing  brought  together  the  members  of  the 
liousehold  to  eat  and  to  drink  in  the  presence  of  Jehovah  ;  and 
besides  these,  there  were  less  regularly  recurring  events  which  were 
celebrated  in  one  circle  after  another.  .  .  .  The  occasion  arising  out 
of  daily  life  is  thus  inseparable  from  the  holy  action,  and  is  what 
gives  it  meaning  and  character ;  an  end  corresponding  to  the  situa- 
tion always  underlies  it."  ^ 

And  this  is  the  case  even  in  regard  to  the  more  distinc- 
tively national  feasts : — 

"  It  cannot  be  doubted,  generally  speaking  and  on  the  whole,  that 
not  only  in  the  Jehovistic  but  also  in  the  Deuteronomic  legislation  ^ 
the  festivals  rest  upon  agriculture,  the  basis  at  once  of  life  and  of 
religion.  The  soil,  the  fruitful  soil,  is  the  object  of  religion  ;  it 
takes  the  place  alike  of  heaven  and  of  hell.  Jehovah  gives  the  land 
and  its  produce.  He  receives  the  best  of  what  it  yields  as  an  ex- 
pression of  thankfulness,  the  tithes  in  recognition  of  his  seignorial 
right.  The  relation  between  Himself  and  His  people  first  arose  from 
His  having  given  them  the  land  in  fee ;  it  continues  to  be  main- 
tained, inasmuch  as  good  weather  and  fertility  come  from  Him."  ^ 

So  that  the  great  feasts,  which  were  the  prominent  fea- 
tures of  the  worship,  are  ultimately  traceable  to  the 
Canaanites,  just  like  Nabiism,  which  was  a  chief  char- 
acteristic of  the  religion.     For — 

"Agriculture  was  learned  by  the  Hebrews  from  the  Canaanites, 
in  whose  land  they  settled,  and  in  commingling  with  whom  they, 


1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  76. 

2  These  two  stages  of  legislation,  as  will  appear  in  the  sequel,  are  placed 
by  the  critical  school,  the  former  in  the  earlier  writing  period,  and  the 
latter  about  621  B.C. 

3  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  91  f. 


364      Authoritative  Institutions — their  lieligious  Basis. 

during  the  period  of  the  Judges,  made  the  transition  to  a  sedentary- 
life.  Before  the  metamorphosis  of  shepherds  into  peasants  was 
effected,  they  could  not  possibly  have  had  feasts  which  related  to 
tigriculture.  It  would  have  been  strange  if  they  had  not  taken 
them  also  over  from  the  Canaanites,  The  latter  owed  the  land  and 
its  fruits  to  Baal,  and  for  this  they  paid  him  the  due  tribute  ;  the 
Israelites  stood  in  the  same  relation  to  Jehovah.  Materially  and  in 
itself  the  act  was  neither  heathenish  nor  Israelite ;  its  character 
either  way  was  determined  by  its  destination.  There  was  therefore 
nothing  against  a  transference  of  the  feasts  from  Baal  to  Jehovah ; 
on  the  contrary,  the  transference  was  a  profession  of  faith  that  the 
land  and  its  produce,  and  thus  all  that  lay  at  the  foundations  of  the 
national  existence,  were  due  not  to  the  heathen  deity,  but  to  the 
God  of  Israel."  i 

The  transition  from  this  simpler  and  more  naturalistic 
phase  of  worship  to  distinctively  religions  and  non-secular 
observance  took  place,  according  to  the  theory,  in  con- 
nection with  and  in  consequence  of  the  movement  for 
centralisation  of  worship,  that  culminated  in  the  introduc- 
tion of  the  Deuteronomic  Code  and  the  reform  in  the  time 
of  Josiah.  The  view  is,  that  up  to  that  time  the  worship 
at  the  Bamoth  or  high  places  up  and  down  the  land  ^  was 
the  regular  and  normal  thing,  and  that  the  reform  of 
Josiah  abolished  these  local  sanctuaries,  and  concentrated 
the  worship  at  the  one  sanctuary  at  Jerusalem,  thus  sever- 
ing the  connection  between  the  old  joyous  religious  wor- 
ship and  the  daily  life  (p.  77).  "Deuteronomy  indeed 
does  not  contemplate  such  a  result,"  and,  as  we  have  al- 
ready seen,  the  assertion  is  that  still  in  the  Deuteronomic 
legislation  the  festivals  rest  upon  agriculture.  The  transi- 
tion was  only  fully  effected  in  the  Priestly  Code  (which 
dates  at  the  earliest  from  the  time  of  Ezra). 

"  Human  life  has  its  root  in  local  environment,  and  so  also  had 
the  ancient   cultus ;   in  being  transplanted  from  its  natural  soil 


1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  93  f.  ^  g^e  before,  chap.  viii.  p.  199  ff. 


Severance  of  Worship  from  Daily  Life.  365 

it  was  deprived  of  its  natural  nourishment.  A  separation  between 
it  and  the  daily  life  was  inevitable,  and  Deuteronomy  itself  paved 
the  way  for  this  result  by  permitting  profane  slaughtering.  A  man 
lived  in  Hebron,  but  sacrificed  in  Jerusalem  ;  life  and  worship  fell 
apart.  The  consequences  which  lie  dormant  in  the  Deuteronomic 
law  are  fully  developed  in  the  Priestly  Code"  (ibid.,  p.  77). 

And  then  as  to  the  distinctively  historical  references 
which  the  feasts  eventually  attained,  Wellhausen  says : — 

"  It  is  in  Deuteronomy  that  one  detects  the  first  very  perceptible 
traces  of  a  historical  dress  being  given  to  the  religion  and  the  wor- 
ship, but  this  process  is  still  confined  within  modest  limits.  The 
historical  event  to  which  recurrence  is  always  made  is  the  bringing 
up  of  Israel  out  of  Egypt,  and  this  is  significant  in  so  far  as  the 
bringing  up  out  of  Egypt  coincides  with  the  leading  into  Canaan, 
that  is,  with  the  giving  of  the  land,  so  that  the  historical  motive 
again  resolves  itself  into  the  natural.  In  this  way  it  can  be  said 
til  at  not  merely  the  Easter  festival  but  all  festivals  are  dependent 
upon  the  introduction  of  Israel  into  Canaan,  and  this  is  what  we 
actually  find  very  clearly  in  the  prayer  (Deut.  xxvi.)  with  which  at 
the  Feast  of  Tabernacles  the  share  of  the  festal  gifts  falling  to  the 
priest  is  offered  to  the  Deity"  (ibid.,  p.  92). 

It  is,  how^ever,  as  has  been  said,  in  the  Priestly  Code 
that  the  development  is  fully  carried  out,  and 

"the  feasts  entirely  lose  their  peculiar  characteristics,  the  occa- 
sions by  which  they  are  inspired  and  distinguished  :  by  the  mon- 
otonous sameness  of  the  unvarying  burnt- off'ering  and  sin-offering 
of  the  community  as  a  whole,  they  are  all  put  on  the  same  even 
level,  deprived  of  their  natural  spontaneity,  and  degraded  into  mere 
*  exercises  of  religion.'  Only  some  very  slight  traces  continue  to 
bear  witness  to,  we  might  rather  say  to  betray,  what  was  the 
point  from  which  the  development  started — namely,  the  rites  of 
the  barley-sheaf,  the  loaves  of  bread,  and  the  booths  (Levit.  xxiii.) 
But  these  are  mere  rites,  petrified  remains  of  the  old  custom"  (ibid., 
p.  100). 

There  is  a  certain  coherence  and  roundness  about  this 
theory  that  make  it  very  specious ;  but  unfortunately  it 


366      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Eeligious  Basis. 

is  supported  by  little  positive  proof,  and  it  fails,  besides, 
to  give  an  adequate  account  of  well-established  facts. 

(a)  In  the  first  place,  no  one  can  object  to  the  state- 
ment that  "religious  worship  was  a  natural  thing  in 
Hebrew  antiquity  ;  it  was  the  blossom  of  life,  the  heights 
and  depths  of  which  it  was  its  business  to  transfigure 
and  glorify"  (p.  77).  But  just  because  it  was  so,  we 
should  have  expected  the  worship  to  pass  beyond  the 
ordinary  level  of  the  soil  to  those  "  heights  and  depths " 
which  had  been  reached  in  connection  with  the  early 
national  history.  It  is  simply  inconceivable  that  a 
people  who  were  ever  erecting  pillars  and  offering  sacri- 
fices to  commemorate  deliverances  or  celebrate  victories, 
who  associated  ever  so  many  places  with  events  in  their 
religious  history,  and  who  had,  from  the  time  of  Moses, 
passed  through  an  unparalleled  experience,  should  still, 
in  the  time  of  Hosea  or  later,  have  practised  merely  a 
worship  whose  sole  motives  were  "threshing-floor  and 
wine-press,  corn  and  wine,"  and  "vociferous  joy,  merry 
snoutings  its  expression  "  (p.  98).  By  the  time  of  Hosea, 
Israel  had  lived  through  a  very  considerable  part  of  its 
national  and  political  existence,  and  by  the  days  of  Josiah 
that  life  had  wellnigh  run  its  course.  Yet  Wellhausen 
would  have  us  believe  that,  even  as  late  as  the  time  of 
Josiah,  the  first  perceptible  trace  is  visible  of  a  historical 
reference  in  the  worship,  and  that,  in  the  time  of  Hosea, 

"the  blessing  of  the  land  is  the  end  of  religion,  and  that  quite 
generally — alike  of  the  false  heathenish  and  of  the  true  Israeli tish. 
It  has  for  its  basis  no  historical  acts  of  salvation,  but  nature  simply, 
which,  however,  is  regarded  only  as  God's  domain  and  as  man's  field 
of  labour,  and  is  in  no  manner  deified.  The  land  is  Jehovah's 
house,^  wherein  He  lodges,  and  entertains  the  nation ;  in  the  land 


^  Hosea  viii   1,  ix.  15. 


The  Land  JehovaNs  House.  367 

and  through  the  land  it  is  that  Israel  first  becomes  the  people  of 
Jehovah.  ...  In  accordance  with  this,  worship  consists  simply  of 
the  thanksgiving  due  for  the  gifts  of  the  soil,  the  vassalage  payable 
to  the  superior  who  has  given  the  land  and  its  fruits  "  (p.  97). 

In  opposition  to  this  low  and  narrow  view  of  the  con- 
ceptions of  that  time,  we  can  point  to  the  fact  before  con- 
sidered,^ that  Hosea  dates  the  intimate  union  between 
Jahaveh  and  His  people  from  the  exodus  and  the  desert 
life,  before  the  land  had  become  "  Jehovah's  house."  In 
the  very  passages  which  Wellhausen  here  cites,  a  distinc- 
tion is  drawn  between  the  Baalim  (unlawful  lovers)  and 
Jahaveh  (the  rightful  husband),  as  if  to  prove  that  it  was 
not  "through  the  land  that  Israel  first  became  the  people  of 
Jehovah."  No  doubt  an  agricultural  people,  if  they  would 
offer  anything  to  their  God,  must  offer  what  they  had, — 
the  fruits  of  the  land ;  but  does  a  Christian  who  gives  his 
money  for  missions,  let  us  say,  recognise  no  blessing  that 
God  has  bestowed  upon  him  but  silver  and  gold  ?  No 
doubt  Hosea  and  all  the  prophets,  early  and  late,  connect 
the  fertility  of  the  land  and  material  prosperity  with  the 
blessing  of  Jahaveh  and  the  fidelity  of  His  people,  as 
many  people  still  do.^  But  the  thing  to  be  noted  is 
that  Hosea,  appealing  to  the  consciousness  of  the  men 
of   his   time,   reminds   them   of   God's   doings   for  them 

^  See  chap.  v.  p.  110. 

2  Wellhausen's  own  opinion  is  frankly  stated  in  another  place.  In  speak- 
ing of  Samuel's  words,  "  God  forbid  tliat  I  should  cease  to  pray  for  you  and 
teach  you  the  good  way"  (1  Sam.  xii.  23),  he  makes  the  comment:  "They 
do  not  need  to  trouble  themselves  about  means  for  warding  off  the  attacks 
of  their  enemies  ;  if  they  fast  and  pray,  and  give  up  their  sins,  Jehovah 
hurls  back  the  foe  with  His  thunder  and  lightning,  and  so  long  as  they 
are  pious  He  will  not  allow  their  land  to  be  invaded.  All  the  expenses  are 
then  naturally  superfluous  by  which  a  people  usually  safeguards  its  own 
existence.  That  this  view  is  unhistorical  is  self-evident.  .  .  .  It  is  the 
offspring  of  exilic  or  post-exilic  Judaism." — Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  255. 


368      Authoritative  Institutions — their  lleligious  Basis. 

as  a  people  in  the  early  days.  His  very  reproof,  in  the 
connection  appealed  to,  is  one  against  unfaithfulness  to 
Him  who  had  betrothed  Israel  to  Himself  before  they 
came  into  Canaan ;  and  "  I  refuse  to  believe "  (to  adopt 
one  of  Wellhausen's  modes  of  reasoning^)  that  a  pro- 
phet with  views  so  advanced  as  Hosea  saw  no  more 
in  worship  than  an  acknowledgment  of  vassalage,  pay- 
able to  the  superior  of  the  land,  whoever  he  might 
be.  Yet  not  only  in  the  days  of  Hosea,  but  two  cen- 
turies later,  Wellhausen  would  have  us  believe  that 
Israel  was  in  this  condition,  for  "it  is  in  Deuteronomy 
that  one  detects  the  first  very  perceptible  traces^  of 
a  historical  dress  being  given  to  the  religion  and  the 
worship."  That  it  is,  however,  "  confined  within  modest 
limits,"  he  tries  to  prove  from  the  prayer  or  hymn  which 
was  uttered  at  the  presentation  of  fruits.  He  quotes  the 
prayer  at  length,  but  if  it  has  any  meaning  at  all,  every 
clause  of  it  contradicts  the  conclusion  built  upon  it : — 

"  A  wandering  Aramsean  was  my  father ;  and  he  went  down  to 
Egypt,  and  sojourned  there  a  few  men  strong,  and  became  there  a 
nation,  great,  mighty,  and  populous.  And  the  Egyptians  evil  en- 
treated them,  and  oppressed  them,  and  laid  upon  them  hard 
bondage.  Then  called  we  upon  Jehovah,  the  God  of  our  fathers, 
and  He  heard  our  voice,  and  looked  on  our  affliction,  and  our 
labour,  and  our  oppression.  And  Jehovah  brought  us  forth  out  of 
Egypt  with  a  mighty  hand,  and  with  an  outstretched  arm,  and  with 
great  terribleness,  and  with  signs,  and  with  wonders  ;  and  brought  us 
unto  this  'place,  and  gave  us  this  land,  a  land  where  milk  and  honey 
flow.  And  now,  behold,  I  have  brought  the  best  of  the  fruits  of  the  land 
which  Thou,  0  Lord,  hast  given  me  "  (Deut.  xxvi.) 

Wellhausen  emphasises  the  words  put  in  italics,  and 
concludes  triumphantly  (p.  92),  "Observe  here  how  the 

^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  51. 

2  Compare  Kuenen's  account  of  "nascent  monotheism"  at  the  same 
period.     See  above,  chap.  xii.  p.  320. 


The  basket  of  Fruiis.  ^%^'        369 

act  of  salvation  whereby  Israel  was  founded  issues  in  the 
gift  of  a  fruitful  land."  We  all  knew  that,  as  we  also 
knew  that  the  only  gift  which  Israel  could  offer  in  return 
was  the  produce  of  the  land.  But  what  of  all  the  other 
blessings,  of  a  national  and  religious  hind,  which  are 
heaped  up,  clause  by  clause,  as  if  the  suppliant  would  stir 
up  his  soul,  and  all  that  was  within  him,  to  forget  not  all 
the  benefits  bestowed  upon  the  nation  ?  "Re  went  down. 
.  .  .  The  Egyptians  evil  entreated  them.  ...  He  heard 
our  voice  and  brought  us  forth."  If  the  author  of  this 
prayer  had  not  a  clear  recognition  of  the  unity  of  the 
nation  from  the  time  of  the  patriarchs,  and  of  the  national 
blessings  from  first  to  last  which  they  had  received,  then 
language  has  no  meaning.  It  seems  to  me  that  this 
little  basket  of  fruit,  like  Gideon's  cake  of  barley-bread, 
upsets  the  whole  array  of  Wellhausen's  well-marshalled 
argument  of  feasts  taken  over  from  the  Canaanites,  and 
tribute  offered  indifferently  to  Baal  or  Jahaveh,  as  lord 
paramount  of  the  land,  not  to  speak  of  "the  soil,  the 
fruitful  soil,  taking  the  place  alike  of  heaven  and  hell." 
As  to  the  references  to  agricultural  matters  in  even  the 
earliest  code,  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  which  are  made 
so  much  of  to  prove  that  this  legislation  could  have  had 
no  existence  till  Israel  came  into  Palestine,  it  is  enough 
to  say  that  it  is  taken  for  granted  that  Moses  had  no 
knowledge  of  agricultural  situations,  and  that  he  had 
no  idea  he  was  leading  his  people  into  a  country  like 
Palestine,  or  no  forethought  to  give  them  guidance  for 
their  ordinary  life  in  it ;  for  none  of  which  have  critical 
writers  any  authority.^ 

(b)  Again,    an    influence     altogether    exaggerated    is 
ascribed  to  the  centralisation  of  worship.     This,  indeed, 

•       ^  See  Note  XXIV. 
2  A 


370      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Religious  Basis. 

is  Wellhausen's  strong  point,  on  which  he  rests  his 
whole  theory.  "  My  whole  position/'  he  says,  "  is 
contained  in  my  first  chapter  [entitled,  The  Place  of 
Worship] ;  there  I  have  placed  in  a  clear  light  that 
which  is  of  such  importance  for  Israelite  history — 
namely,  the  part  taken  by  the  prophetical  party  in  the 
great  metamorphosis  of  the  worship,  which  by  no  means 
came  about  of  itself."^  Speaking  of  Hosea  and  Amos, 
he  says: — 

"  The  language  held  by  these  men  was  one  hitherto  unheard  of, 
when  they  declared  that  Gilgal,  and  Bethel,  and  Beersheba,  Jeho- 
vah's favourite  seats,  were  an  abomination  to  Him ;  that  the  gifts 
and  offerings  with  which  He  was  honoured  there  kindled  His 
wrath  instead  of  appeasing  it ;  that  Israel  was  destined  to  be 
buried  under  the  ruins  of  His  temples,  where  protection  and 
refuge  were  sought  (Amos  ix.)  .  .  .  That  the  holy  places  should 
be  abolished,  but  the  cultus  itself  remain  as  before  the  main  con- 
cern of  religion,  only  limited  to  a  single  locality,  was  by  no  means 
their  wish.  But  at  the  same  time,  in  point  of  fact,  it  came  about 
as  an  incidental  result  of  their  teaching  that  the  high  place  of 
Jerusalem  ultimately  abolished  all  the  other  Bamoth.  External 
circumstances,  it  must  be  added,  contributed  most  essentially 
towards  the  result"  (p.  23  f.) 

He  then  goes  on  to  explain  (p.  24)  how  the  downfall  of 
the  kingdom  of  Samaria  left  the  way  clear  for  the  sanc- 
tuary at  Jerusalem  to  assume  importance.  Still,  although 
Hezekiah  is  said  to  have  even  in  his  time  made  an  at- 
tempt to  abolish  the  Bamoth  (p.  25),^  it  was  not  till  about 
a  century  after  the  destruction  of  Samaria  that  men  ven- 
tured "  to  draw  the  practical  conclusion  from  the  belief 
in  the  unique  character  of  the  temple  at  Jerusalem" 
(p.  26).  This  was  done,  not  "  from  a  mere  desire  to 
be  logical,  but  with  a  view  to  further  reforms ; "  and  so 
prophets  and  priests  combined  to  prepare  the  Code  of 

^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  368,  -  See  below,  p,  450. 


Centralisation  of  Worship.  371 

Deuteronomy,  which  was  officially  and  for  the  first 
time  to  authorise  the  Jerusalem  Temple  as  the  place  of 
worship. 

"The  turning-point  in  the  history  of  the  sacrificial  system  was 
the  reformation  of  Josiah  ;  what  we  find  in  the  Priestly  Code  is  the 
matured  result  of  that  event "  (p.  76). 

"  The  spiritualisation  of  the  worship  is  seen  in  the  Priestly  Code 
as  advancing  'pari  passu  with  its  centralisation.  It  receives,  so  to 
speak,  an  abstract  religious  character ;  it  separates  itself,  in  the 
first  instance,  from  daily  life,  and  then  absorbs  the  latter  by  be- 
coming, strictly  speaking,  its  proper  business"  (p.  81). 

Of  the  alleged  influence  of  the  prophets  in  bringing 
about  centralisation  of  worship  and  codification  of  the 
law,  and  also  of  the  alleged  discrepancy  of  the  three 
Codes,  we  shall  have  to  speak  at  length  in  the  sequel.  In 
the  meantime,  attention  must  be  drawn  to  this  effect  of 
centralisation  on  the  spirit  and  heg.rtiness  of  the  worship. 
Wellhausen's  idea  is,  that  "  to  celebrate  the  vintage  fes- 
tival among  one's  native  hills,  and  to  celebrate  it  at 
Jerusalem,  were  two  very  different  things ; "  that  "  it  was 
not  the  same  thing  to  appear  by  one's  self  at  home  before 
Jehovah,  and  to  lose  one's  self  in  a  large  congregation  at 
the  common  seat  of  worship  "  (p.  77) ;  and  hence  that  the 
old  joyousness  of  the  feasts  was  destroyed  by  the  cele- 
bration at  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem.  Now,  admitting  for 
a  moment  that  this  centralisation  took  place  in  the  way 
he  explains,  it  simply  is  not  the  fact  that  the  joyous 
feature  disappeared.  Delitzsch  has  shown  ^  that  in  the 
period  of  the  second  Temple,  when  the  Priestly  Code 
received   paramount   attention,   and    when    the   national 

1  "  Dancing  and  the  Criticism  of  the  Pentateuch  in  relation  to  one 
another,"  now  published  along  with  other  i>aper8  in  *  Iris,  Studies  in  Colour 
and  Talks  about  Flowers,'  1869. 


372      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Religious  Basis. 

life  was  none  of  the  happiest,  even  the  most  solemn 
feasts  of  Israel  were  occasions  of  joyful  merrymaking, 
and  some  of  them  remarkably  so.  It  is  shallow  and 
unnatural  to  speak,  in  this  connection,  of  "  the  antithesis 
between  spiritual  earnestness  and  secular  joyousness" 
(p.  76).  For  a  people,  as  Delitzsch  says,  "  is  and  remains  a 
natural,  not  a  spiritual  quantity,  and  therefore  celebrates 
even  religious  festivals  with  a  natural  outburst  of  feeling, 
simple  mirth,  jubilant  exultation.  It  lies  in  the  nature 
of  a  people  as  such."^  We  have  only  to  think  of  the 
infectious  influence  of  a  great  throng  at  any  public  cele- 
bration, of  the  thorough  and  hearty  manner  in  which  all 
Orientals  enter  into  any  occasion  of  public  rejoicing,  and 
finally,  of  the  aid  to  enjoyment  furnished  by  the  kindly 
climate,  to  see  that  Wellhausen's  position  is  altogether 
opposed  to  human  experience.  And  over  against  this 
sapient  talk  of  the  individual  losing  himself  in  the  great 
crowd,  and  the  depressing  influence  of  "  exercises  of  re- 
ligion," I  would  simply  set  those  psalms  that  speak  of 
the  festive  throng,  and  express  the  psalmist's  delight  in 
the  public  celebrations  of  religion.  If  these  psalms  be 
early,  or  if  they  be  late,  they  tell  equally  against  the 
theory ;  for  they  exhibit  a  delight  not  only  in  nature,  but 
in  the  God  of  nature,  and  above  all,  in  the  service  of  a 
God  who  had,  in  the  nation's  history,  done  great  things 
for  them,  whereof  they  were  glad. 

(c)  Once  more,  Wellhausen  fails  to  prove  that  mere 
nature  feasts  passed  over  in  the  time  he  mentions  into  the 
religious  festivals  of  the  Deuteronomic  or  Priestly  Codes. 
That  the  three  great  cycle  feasts,  Passover,  Pentecost,  and 
Succoth,  fell  at  or  were  fixed  at  turning-points  in  the 
natural  year,  and  that  the  celebration  of  them  had  pointed 

1  Iris,  p.  196. 


Agricultural  Basis  of  Great  Feasts.  373 

reference  to  the  agricultural  seasons,  is  very  far  from 
being  the  same  as  to  say  that  they  grew  out  of  and  for 
centuries  remained  merely  agricultural  festivals.  One 
might  as  well  argue  that  all  the  festivals  of  the  "  Christian 
year"  have  their  sole  reference  to  the  natural  seasons. 
What  Wellhausen  says  of  the  soil  being  the  basis  of 
religion,  has  this  much  of  truth  in  it,  that  the  teachers  of 
religion  always,  and  rightly,  sought  to  impress  upon  the 
people  the  material  blessings  which  God  bestowed.  The 
task,  however,  before  him  is  to  explain  how  the  historical 
references  in  these  feasts  came  in,  as  they  did  come  in 
somehow,  sooner  or  later.  Having  described,  as  an  instance 
of  what  he  is  pleased  to  call  "  the  manner  of  the  older 
worship  as  we  are  made  acquainted  with  it  in  Hos.  ii.,  ix., 
and  elsewhere,"  ^  the  celebration  of  the  vintage  festival 
by  the  Canaanite  population  of  Shechem  (not  very  high 
authorities  on  such  matters,  we  should  say) ;  and  having 
referred  to  the  yearly  festival  in  the  vineyards  at  Shiloh, 
as  mentioned  in  the  book  of  Judges,^ — he  looks  about  for 
proof  that  these  or  suchlike  are  the  three  cycle  feasts 
prescribed  in  the  book  of  the  Covenant  or  Jehovistic  leg- 
islation. And  what  does  he  find?  "Amos  and  Hosea, 
presupposing  as  they  do  a  splendid  cultus  and  great 
sanctuaries,  doubtless  also  knew  of  a  variety  of  festivals, 
but  they  have  no  occasion  to  mention  any  one  by  name  " 
(p.  95).  This  is  extraordinary  meekness  in  one  who  is 
in  the  constant  habit  of  declaring,  when  a  prophet  does 
not  mention  a  thing,  that  he  knew  nothing  at  all  about 
it  because  it  had  no  existence.  But  stay  !  "  More  definite 
notices  occur  in  Isaiah.  The  threatening  that  within  a 
year's  time  the  Assyrians  will  be  in  the  land  is  thus 
(xxix.   1)  given :  '  Add  ye   year  to  year,  let   the   feasts 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  107.  ^  ibjjj^  ^   94  .  Judges  ix.  27,  xxi.  19  f. 


374      Authoritative  Institutions — their  Religious  Basis. 

come  round;  yet  I  will  distress  Jerusalem/  and  at  the 
close  of  the  same  discourse  the  prophet  expresses  himself 
as  follows  (xxxii.  9  seq.)  :  '  Eise  up,  ye  women  that  are  at 
ease ;  hear  my  voice,  ye  careless  daughters ;  give  ear  unto 
my  speech.  Days  upon  a  year  shall  ye  be  troubled,  ye 
careless  women ;  for  the  vintage  shall  fail,  the  ingather- 
ing shall  not  come.  Ye  shall  smite  upon  the  breasts,  for 
the  pleasant  fields,  for  the  fruitful  vine.* "  Putting  these 
two  passages  together,  he  pictures  Isaiah,  after  the  uni- 
versal custom  of  the  prophets,  coming  forward  at  a  great 
popular  autumn  festival,  in  wliich  the  women  also  took 
an  active  part.  But  this  aulAimn  festival,  he  argues, 
takes  place  at  the  change  of  the  year,  as  may  be  inferred 
from  the  phrase  "  let  the  feasts  come  round,"  and  "  closes 
a  cycle  of  festivals  here  for  the  first  time  indicated "  (p. 
96).  It  gives  me  pleasure  to  say  that  I  quite  agree  with 
the  sentence  that  follows :  "  The  preceding  survey,  it 
must  be  admitted,  scarcely  seems  fully  to  establish  the 
alleged  agreement  between  the  Jehovistic  law  and  the 
older  praxis."  "  Names,"  he  goes  on  to  remark,  '*'  are 
nowhere  to  be  found,  and  in  point  of  fact  it  is  only  the 
autumn  festival  that  is  well  attested,  and  this,  it  would 
appear,  as  the  only  festival,  as  the  feast.  And  doubtless 
it  was  also  the  oldest  and  most  important  of  the  harvest 
festivals,  as  it  never  ceased  to  be  the  concluding  solem- 
nity of  the  year."  All  thafc  needs  to  be  said  on  this  part 
of  the  argument  is  this  :  Isaiah's  reference  to  feasts  "  com- 
ing round "  may  quite  as  suitably  apply  to  feasts  which 
have  a  religious  and  historical  meaning  as  to  purely  agri- 
cultural celebrations,  and  his  references  in  the  close  of 
his  address,  if  they  are  not  indeed  quite  general,  may 
equally  apply  to  the  feasts  as  they  are  prescribed  in 
the    law.       If    on    these    slight    notices    the    modern 


Introduction  of  Historical  Reference.  375 

critics  are  satisfied  to  base  the  proof  of  a  set  cycle  of 
agricultural  feasts,  we  ought  to  hear  less  of  the  argument 
from  silence  as  conclusive  of  the  non-existence  of  the 
Mosaic  feasts:  but  of  this  again.^  Attention  should  be 
given  to  the  difficulty  experienced  by  Wellhausen  in 
accounting  for  the  historical  reference  which  undoubtedly 
is  attached  to  the  feasts  in  the  Codes,  even  in  the  earliest.^ 

"  According  as  stress  is  laid  upon  the  common  character  of  the 
festival  and  uniformity  in  its  observance,  in  precisely  the  same  de- 
gree does  it  become  separated  from  the  roots  from  which  it  sprang, 
and  grow  more  and  more  abstract.  That  it  is  then  very  ready  to 
assume  a  historical  meaning  may  partly  also  be  attributed  to  the 
circumstance  that  history  is  not,  like  harvest,  a  personal  experience 
of  individual  households,  but  rather  an  experience  of  the  nation  as 
a  whole.  One  does  not  fail  to  observe,  of  course,  that  the  festivals 
— which  always  to  a  certain  degree  have  a  centralising  tendency — 
have  in  themselves  a  disposition  to  become  removed  from  the  particu- 
lar motives  of  their  institution,  but  in  no  part  of  the  legislation  has 
this  gone  so  far  as  in  the  Priestly  Code  "  (p.  103). 

"  For  after  they  have  lost  their  original  contents  and  degenerated 
into  mere  prescribed  religious  forms,  there  is  nothing  to  prevent  the 
refilling  of  the  empty  bottles  in  any  way  accordant  with  the  tastes 
of  the  period"  (p.  102). 

And  so,  in  a  word — 

"  One  can  characterise  the  entire  Priestly  Code  as  the  wilderness 
legislation,  inasmuch  as  it  abstracts  from  the  natural  conditions  and 
motives  of  the  actual  life  of  the  people  in  the  land  of  Canaan,  and 
rears  the  hierocracy  on  the  tabula  rasa  of  the  wilderne'ss,  the  nega- 
tion of  nature,  by  means  of  the  bald  statutes  of  arbitrary  absolutism  " 
(p.  104). 

A  great  deal  of  this  mode  of  representing  the  Priestly 
Code  arises  from  ignoring  or  misstating  the  character  of 
that  Code,  which  is  brief,  terse,  technical,  a  manual  for 
ceremonial  to  the  priests,  rather  than  a  book  of  exhorta- 

'  3ee  below,  p.  401.  2  g^e  Exod.  xxiii.  15, 


376      Authoritative  Institutions— their  Beligious  Basis. 

tion  and  guidance  to  the  people  like  Deuteronomy.  For 
the  rest,  Wellhausen  fails  entirely  to  show  any  occasion 
for  this  late  turning  of  the  reference  from  agriculture  to 
national  history.  These  ceremonies,  we  are  to  suppose, 
went  on  from  year  to  year  with  their  accompaniments  of 
presentation  of  fruits  and  so  forth.  That  is  to  say,  they 
were  never  "  separated  from  the  roots  from  which  they 
sprang."  The  mere  fact  of  centralisation  might  add  to 
the  richness  of  the  ceremonies,  as  is  always  the  case ;  but 
this,  one  would  suppose,  would  prevent  them  from  becom- 
ing "  more  and  more  abstract."  The  people  were  as  much 
an  agricultural  people  after  Josiah's  time  as  before ;  prob- 
ably they  were  much  less  of  a  mercantile  people  than  they 
had  been  at  an  earlier  period  of  the  monarchy.  If  the 
great  events  of  the  exodus,  the  conquest  of  Canaan,  and 
in  general  the  experiences  which  had  made  them  a  nation, 
did  not  impress  the  national  consciousness  when  it  was 
plastic  and  fresh,  are  we  to  suppose  that,  for  the  first  time 
when  foreign  nations  were  about  to  sweep  them  away, 
they  began  to  read  into  their  worship  and  ceremonial  a 
meaning  which  had  not  occurred  to  them  for  centuries  ? 
If  at  a  time  when  Hosea  and  Amos  were  reminding  them 
of  the  days  of  the  youth  of  the  nation,  and  thus  appealing 
to  the  strongest  motives  that  could  influence  them — if  at 
such  a  time  there  were  many  feasts  and  imposing  rituals, 
are  we  to  suppose  that  not  once  in  all  these  was  there  a 
commemoration  of  the  founding  of  the  nation,  and  of  the 
achievement  of  the  nation's  success  ?  No  doubt  the  feasts, 
at  such  times  as  those  of  Hosea  and  Amos,  would  be  over- 
laid with  superstitious  observances.  But  that  is  not  the 
point.  Because  the  modern  Greeks  at  Jerusalem  make 
Easter  a  time  of  riot,  are  we  to  conclude  that  Easter  does 
not  commemorate  the  resurrection  ?   What  country  has  not, 


The  Tabula  Easa  of  the  Desert.  377 

at  one  time  or  another,  thus  buried  its  holiest  associations 
under  carnal  and  sensuous  forms  ?  All  this  does  not  suf- 
fice to  show  that  the  better  meaning  does  not  underlie  the 
institution ;  much  less  that  a  better  meaning  is  merely  an 
afterthought,  read  into  an  empty  form,  just  because  it  is 
empty.  Forms  are  never  empty  in  the  strict  sense.  They 
are  full  of  something.  The  corrupt  must  be  purged  oui 
before  the  clean  can  be  poured  in;  and  we  can  find  no 
time  in  Israel's  history  at  which  a  tabula  rasa  was  formed, 
and  history  made  out  of  nothing.  Even  the  critical  school 
has  to  admit,  as  we  shall  see,  that  the  Priestly  Code  was  a 
gathering  up  of  the  practice  which  had  prevailed  before 
the  exile ;  and  without  coming  so  far  down,  we  see  enough 
already  in  the  Deuteronomic  Code  to  convince  us  that  the 
historical  reference  was  full  and  clear  when  that  Code  was 
drawn  up.  Nay,  even  in  the  Jehovistic  book  of  the 
Covenant,  the  Passover  is  made  distinctly  to  refer  to  the 
coming  out  of  Egypt. 

Wellhausen's  difficulties  over  the  Passover  may  indeed 
be  pointed  to  as  evidence  of  the  weakness  of  his  theory  at 
its  foundation.  The  following  is  his  account  of  the  matter : 
As  the  Israelites  were  a  pastoral  people  before  they  be- 
came agriculturists,  their  oldest  feasts  must  have  had  a 
pastoral  basis  (p.  92  f.)  The  Passover  is  a  remnant  of 
these,  and  is,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  the  oldest  of 
all  the  feasts,  its  primary  form  being  the  offering  of  the 
firstlings  ;  and  so,  with  perfect  accuracy,  it  is  postulated  as 
the  occasion  of  the  exodus  (p.  87).  The  exodus  was  not 
the  occasion  of  the  festival,  but  the  festival  the  occa- 
sion, if  only  a  pretended  one,  of  the  exodus  (p.  88).  "  Let 
my  people  go,  that  they  may  keep  a  feast  unto  me  in  the 
wilderness,  with  sacrifices  and  cattle  and  sheep ; " — this 
from  the  first  is  the  deniand  made  upon  Pharaoh.     And 


378      Autlioritative  Institntions — their  Religious  Basis. 

because  Pharaoh  refuses  to  allow  the  Hebrews  to  offer  to 
their  God  the  firstlings  of  cattle  that  are  His  due,  Jehovah 
seizes  from  him  the  first-born  of  men.  "  But  it  is  curious," 
says  Wellhausen  (p.  93),  "  to  notice  how  little  prominence 
is  afterwards  given  to  this  festival,  which,  from  the  nature 
of  the  case,  is  the  oldest  of  all.  It  cannot  have  been 
known  at  all  to  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  for  there 
(Exod.  xxii.  29,  30)  the  command  is  to  leave  the  firstling 
seven  days  with  its  dam,  and  on  the  eighth  day  to  give  it 
to  Jehovah."  There  are,  however,  two  names  given  to  this 
feast,  Mazzoth  (or  unleavened  bread),  and  Pesach  (passover). 
The  latter  indicates  the  original  character  of  the  feast,  as 
a  sacrifice  of  the  first-born;  but  the  other  name  throws 
light  upon  the  manner  in  which  this  came  into  the  cycle 
of  the  agricultural  feasts.  Mazzoth,  or  unleavened  bread, 
denotes  the  hastily  made  cake  of  the  first  corn,  which  was 
eaten  at  the  time  the  sickle  was  first  put  in  to  commence 
the  harvest,  when  a  sheaf  was  presented  to  the  Lord. 
This  happened  at  the  season  of  the  year  when  tradition 
fixed  the  exodus,  the  spring;  and  in  the  account  of  the 
exodus  it  is  mentioned  (Exod.  xii.  34)  that  in  their  haste 
to  leave  Egypt  the  Israelites  "  took  their  dough  before  it 
was  leavened ; "  and  these  two  circumstances  assisted  in 
the  transition  of  the  conception  to  a  commemorative  feast. 
'•'  Probably,"  says  Wellhausen,  "  through  the  predominance 
gained  by  agriculture,  and  the  feasts  founded  on  it,  the 
Passover  [in  its  original  sense]  fell  into  disuse  in  many 
parts  of  Israel,  and  kept  its  ground  only  in  districts  where 
the  pastoral  and  wilderness  life  still  retained  its  import- 
ance "  (p.  93).  "  The  elaboration  of  the  historical  motive  of 
the  Passover,"  however,  we  are  told,  "  is  not  earlier  than 
Deuteronomy,  although  perhaps  a  certain  inclination  to 
that  way  of  explaining  it  appears  before  then,  just  as  in 


The  Passover.  379 

the  case  of  the  Mazzoth  (Exod.  xii.  34).  What  has  led  to 
it  is  evidently  the  coincidence  of  the  spring  festival  with 
the  exodus,  already  accepted  by  the  older  tradition,  the 
relation  of  cause  and  effect  having  become  inverted  in 
course  of  time"  (p.  88). 

A  very  ingenious  piece  of  patch- work !  But  the  facts 
are  these  :  The  book  of  the  Covenant  (Exod.  xxiii.  15,  16), 
and  the  related  Law  of  the  Two  Tables  (Exod.  xxxiv.  18  f.), 
which  are  said  by  critics  to  be  older  by  at  least  two  cen- 
turies than  the  Code  of  Deuteronomy,  call  the  feast  Maz- 
zoth or  unleavened  bread,  and  in  both  cases  give  the 
reason  for  keeping  the  feast  that  in  the  month  Abib  the 
people  came  out  of  Egypt.  The  Code  of  Deuteronomy, 
according  to  Wellhausen's  own  authority  (p.  87),  is  the 
first  that  mentions  Pesach,  but  it  has  the  name  Mazzoth 
as  well ;  and  the  elaboration  of  the  historical  motive,  he 
has  just  told  us,  is  not  earlier  than  Deuteronomy.  "  The 
only  view,"  he  says,  "  sanctioned  by  the  nature  of  the  case 
is,  that  the  Israelite  custom  of  offering  the  firstlings  gave 
rise  to  the  narrative  of  the  slaying  of  the  first-born  of 
Egypt:  unless  the  custom  be  presupposed,  the  story  is 
inexplicable,  and  the  peculiar  selection  of  its  victims  by 
the  plague  is  left  without  a  motive  "  (p.  88).  As  to  this 
conclusion,  if  critics  are  to  determine  historical  questions 
by  the  nature  of  the  case  as  they  judge  it,  and  to  assume 
a  liberty  of  putting  effects  for  causes  when  it  suits  them, 
we  may  get  startling  "  scientific  results,"  but  we  make  no 
solid  progress.  What  requires  explanation  is  the  fact 
that  Mazzoth  is  mentioned  as  a  feast  commemorative  of 
the  exodus,  in  what  is  pronounced  the  earliest  legisla- 
tion, and  no  reference  made  therein  to  the  offering  of  the 
firstlings;  and  that  only  two  centuries  later  the  name 
which  is  supposed  to  point  to  the  original  character  of 


380      Aidhoritative  Institutions — their  Religious  Basis. 

the  feast  is  for  the  first  time  employed,  and  yet  the  de- 
scription of  the  feast  agrees  (only  being  fuller)  with  the 
older.  The  truth  is,  as  any  fair-minded  person  may  see, 
this  laborious  attempt  to  foist  in  the  historical  reference 
at  a  late  date  breaks  down  just  because  the  historical 
reference  was  present  from  the  first.  The  fundamental 
fallacy  of  this  whole  argument  is  the  assumption  that  "  in 
the  land  and  through  the  land  it  is  that  Israel  first  be- 
comes the  people  of  Jehovah."  For  this  assertion  there  is 
not  a  scrap  of  evidence,  whereas  the  concurrent  testimony 
of  all  Israelite  antiquity  is,  that  it  was  because  He  had 
chosen  this  people,  and  after  he  had  signalised  His  choice, 
that  He  brought  them  into  a  goodly  land.  And  the  con- 
clusion of  the  matter  is,  that  as  there  was  a  formal  system 
of  law  at  a  much  earlier  time  than  the  critical  theory 
postulates,  so  also  there  was  an  earlier  reference  in  their 
worship  and  ceremonial  to  the  events  in  the  nation's 
religious  history  which  marked  them  out  as  Jahaveh's 
people. 


381 


CHAPTEE    XV. 


THE   THREE   CODES. 

The  legislative  dements  in  the  Pentateuch  a  subject  of  difficulty — The  tradi- 
tional theory  mahes  it  unnecessarily  difficult,  while  the  critical  theory 
raises  greater  difficulties — The  three  positions  of  the  modern  theory  as 
to  the  Codes  :  I.  there  are  three  Codes  ;  II.  far  apart  in  time ;  and 
III.  inconsistent  with  one  another — As  to  I.  there  is  nothing  incon- 
sistent with  Biblical  theory  or  nature  of  the  case  in  variation  or  pro- 
gression of  Codes — Laio  is  modified  even  after  it  is  codified — //.  But  the 
critical  position  is  that  the  Codes  belong  to  times  far  apart — How  this 
conclusion  is  reached — 2he  evidence  of  dates  is  inferential — Argument 
examined — The  booh  of  the  Covenant — No  satisfactory  account  given  of 
introduction  of  this  Code  at  the  alleged  time,  and  why  codification,  once 
begun,  sho%ld  have  stopped  for  two  centuries — What  happened  in  the 
intervals  of  the  Codes? — Wellhausen's  position,  legem  non  habentes,  <fcc. 
— The  two  points  involved  in  this  position :  (1)  argument  from  silence  and 
non-observance;  (2)  praxis  and  programme — ///.  Alleged  inconsistency 
of  the  Codes,  particularly  as  to  the  centralisation  of  worship — The  argu- 
ment examined. 


The  legislative  parts  of  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch,  in 
their  form  and  setting  no  less  than  in  their  contents, 
present  many  difhculties.  The  laws  are  found,  not  col- 
lected together  and  systematised,  but  scattered  over  sev- 
eral books.  Not  only  is  there  a  repetition  in  one  collec- 
tion of  what  may  be  found  in  another,  but  the  same  laws 
may  be  repeated  with  little  or  no  alteration  in  the  same 


382  The  Three  Codes. 

collection.^  And  then  there  are  discrepancies  in  the  regu- 
lations found  in  different  places  on  the  same  subject ;  and 
laws  relating  to  subjects  apparently  the  most  diverse  are 
brought  into  strange  juxtaposition,  as  also  are  laws  bear- 
ing upon  what  seem  very  different  conditions  of  life  and 
states  of  society.  We  should  have  expected  a  writer,  if  he 
were  the  author  of  all  the  legislation,  to  work  more  syste- 
matically :  whether  he  was  early  and  looked  forward  to 
the  future,  or  late  and  looked  back  upon  the  past,  we 
should  have  expected  a  better  arrangement  of  details,  a 
more  completed  whole.  On  what  is  called  the  traditional 
theory,  that  Moses  not  only  gave  the  law,  but  wrote  sub- 
stantially the  books  in  which  it  is  contained,  the  literary 
difficulties  are  very  great  indeed,  and  the  expedients  that 
have  been  resorted  to  in  order  to  remove  them  are  very 
often  artificial  and  hazardous.  The  modern  critical  theory, 
on  the  other  hand,  starting  with  a  good  motive,  gets  in- 
volved in  what  I  consider  a  vicious  method,  and  ends  by 
raising  greater  difficulties  than  those  which  it  attempts  to 
remove.  Advocates  of  the  traditional  theory  burden  them- 
selves with  an  unnecessary  difficulty  by  assuming  that  the 
books  of  the  Pentateuch  were  written  by  Moses ;  for  the 
books  do  not  say  so  of  themselves,  and  even  the  older 
Jewish  tradition  that  Ezra  "  restored "  the  law,  pointed 
to  redaction  as  a  probable  solution  of  many  of  the  diffi- 
culties. Too  much  praise  cannot  be  given  to  those  who 
have  laboured  in  the  field  of  Pentateuch  criticism,  for 
the  minute  examination  they  have  made  of  details,  in  the 
endeavour  to  sift  and  distinguish  the  sources;  and  as  a 
literary  feat,  the  labour  may  be  pronounced  on  the  whole 
successful,  although  it  will  hardly  be  asserted  that  the 

^  Compr.rc  Xum.  xv.  1-16  with  Levib.  i.-vii.  ;  Num.  v.  5-10  with  Levit 
V.  5  flf.,  vi.  5  if.;  Num.  xv.  22-28  with  Levit.  iv.  13  fF. 


The  Codes  distinguished.  383 

last  word  on  the  subject  has  yet  been  spoken.i  At  the 
same  time,  it  seems  to  me  that  the  difficulties  of  the 
critical  theory  increase  at  every  step  when  the  attempt 
is  made  to  determine  the  origin  of  the  Codes^  and  their 
relation  to  one  another  and  to  the  history.  The  three 
leading  positions  of  the  modern  critical  theory  are : 
I.  That  there  are  three  distinct  Codes  of  Law.  II.  That 
these  belong  to  three  different  periods  far  separate.  III. 
That  on  essential  points  the  Codes  differ.  How  these 
positions  are  established,  and  what  consequences  are 
drawn  from  them,  will  be  seen  as  we  proceed. 

I.  By  a  process  of  critical  analysis,  into  which  we  do 
not  here  enter  at  length,  the  legislation  contained  in  the 
Pentateuch  is  divided  into  various  Codes,  distinguished 
by  certain  literary  and  material  characteristics.  (1.)  The 
Code  contained  in  Deuteronomy  stands  by  itself,  marked 
by  a  certain  hortatory  tone,  and  by  the  absence  of  the 
minute  ritual  prescriptions  and  distinctions  found  par- 
ticularly in  the  book  of  Leviticus.  (2.)  There  is  also  dis- 
tinguished a  book  of  the  Covenant  attached  to  the 
Jehovistic  historical  portion  of  the  Pentateuch,  and  em- 
braced in  Exod.  xx.-xxiii. ;  closely  related  to  which,  and 
usually  classed  along  with  it,  is  chap,  xxxiv.  of  the  same 
book,  sometimes  called  the  Law  of  the  Two  Tables. 
(3.)  Then,  in  the  remaining  parts  of  Exodus,  in  the  whole 
of  Leviticus,  and  in  some  chapters  of  Numbers,  are  found 
a  number  of  laws,  moral,  civil,  and  ceremonial,  which  are 
all  classed  together  as  the  Levitical  Code  or  Priestly  Code, 
so  named  from  the  prevalence  of  the  ritual  element  in  its 
contents.  A  portion  of  this  Code,  contained  in  Levit.  xvii.- 
xxvi.,  is  sometimes  spoken  of  as  a  code  or  collection  by 
itself,  the  "law  of   holiness,"  and   supposed    to   have   a 

1  See  Note  XXVI. 


384  The  Three  Codes. 

special  history  of  its  own.  Moreover,  there  is  a  collection 
of  regulations,  mostly  ritual,  found  in  Ezekiel  (from  chap, 
xl.  onwards)  which  it  is  customary  to  take  into  account  in 
the  critical  history  of  the  Codes.  So  far  as  the  legislation 
of  the  Pentateuch,  however,  is  concerned,  we  have  to  deal 
with  the  three  collections — the  Jehovistic  book  of  the 
Covenant  (with  related  chapter),  the  ]3euteronomic  Code, 
and  the  Priestly  Code ;  and  it  is  maintained  that  they  are 
to  be  historically  arranged  in  the  order  in  which  they  have 
just  been  mentioned. 

So  far  there  is  nothing  in  the  modern  theory  essen- 
tially incompatible  with  the  Biblical  account  of  the 
matter,  except  the  order  of  the  Codes.  The  Biblical  order 
is :  Book  of  the  Covenant,  Levitical  Code,  Deuteronomic 
Code ;  but  they  are  ascribed  to  different  times,  although 
these  periods  all  fall  within  the  lifetime  of  Moses.  There 
is  nothing  unreasonable  in  itself  in  the  supposition  that 
laws  or  codes  of  laws  were  promulgated  at  different  times ; 
and  different  sets  of  laws,  so  given,  for  special  purposes 
or  on  special  occasions,  might  run  severally  their  respec- 
tive literary  courses.  Nor  is  it  difficult  to  conceive  how 
such  several  collections  might  overlap  one  another,  and 
after  a  time  have  certain  features  of  inconsistency.  The 
law-books  themselves  give  us  to  understand  that,  as  the 
situation  of  the  people  changed,  the  law  had  a  varying 
reference,  and  even  that  a  law  on  a  certain  subject  might 
be  abrogated  or  modified  to  suit  altered  circumstances. 
So  that,  even  in  the  Biblical  theory,  not  to  speak  of  what 
is  known  of  the  course  of  law  generally,  it  is  possible  for 
law  to  undergo  modification  even  after  ib  is  codified.  We 
find,  for  example,  within  the  compass  of  one  book,  a  modi- 
fication in  the  age  at  which  the  Levites  were  to  serve  at 


Ancient  Institutions  modified.  385 

the  sanctuary.^  Music  of  an  elaborate  kind,  we  know, 
was  introduced  into  the  Temple  service,  though  it  is  not 
prescribed,  as  we  should  expect  to  find  it,  in  the  Levitical 
Code.  Again,  the  law  of  inheritance,  contained  in  Num. 
xxvii.,  is  modified  within  the  Levitical  Code  itself  by 
Num.  xxxvi. ;  and  it  is  notorious  that  by  New  Testament 
times  and  in  modern  Jewish  usage  there  are  modifications 
in  the  manner  of  celebrating  the  Passover,  particularly 
in  the  use  of  wine  and  certain  hymns,  that  constitute  very 
considerable  variations  from  the  ceremonial  prescribed  in 
the  law.  Nay,  Ezra,  to  whom,  on  the  modern  theory,  the 
introduction  of  the  Priestly  Code  is  ascribed,  makes  a 
modification  on  the  amount  of  the  tax  payable  for  the 
expenses  of  the  Temple,^  fixing  it  at  a  third  of  a  shekel, 
whereas  the  code  which  he  is  said  to  have  drawn  up 
fixes  it  at  half  a  shekel.^ 

It  seems,  therefore,  reasonable  to  suppose  that,  just  as 
the  Passover  is  an  institution  of  ancient  Israel,  although 
it  has  gathered  about  it  usages  of  a  comparatively  recent 
time,  so  many  of  the  laws  contained  in  the  Pentateuch 
may,  before  reaching  the  form  in  which  they  now  stand, 
have  been  modified,  tlirough  changing  circumstances  in 
the  national  life,  and  yet  be  in  their  origin  and  character 
Mosaic.  Even  if  we  supposed  that  all  the  laws  of  the  Peuf 
tateuch  were  originally  written  down  by  Moses — though 
the  Biblical  writers  never  say  that  they  were — there 
is  the  probability — nay,  the  certainty — that  these  were 
copied  from  time  to  time  in  whole  or  in  portions.  And 
seeing  that  practice,  in  regard  to  some  things  at  least, 
varied,  and  there  was  no  hesitation   about   introducing 

*  Num.  iv.  3,  viii.  24 ;  comp.  also  1  Chron.  xxiii.  3,  27 ;  2  Chron.  xxxi.  17. 
2  Neh.  X.  32  ff.  2  Exod.  xxx.  13. 

2  B 


38S  Tlie  Three  Codes. 

certain  alterations  in  the  observances,  the  transcriber  in 
a  later  age,  in  writing  out  a  code  for  practical  use,  might, 
so  to  speak,  translate  the  details  of  prevailing  ordinances 
into  the  language  of  his  own  time,  and  describe  the  thing 
in  the  form  in  which  he  knew  it.  If  such  a  double  pro- 
cess went  on,  it  would  go  far  to  account  for  the  strange 
mixture  of  new  and  old  that  we  find  in  these  laws,  some 
relating  to  and  only  practicable  in  the  desert  life  or  a 
more  primitive  state  of  society,  and  others  denoting  a  time 
when  the  national  life  was  in  a  more  consolidated  position. 
In  short,  we  should  have  before  us  a  kind  of  history  of  the 
observances,  on  the  understanding,  however,  that  the  rites 
had  been  observed.  The  aspect  of  the  Levitical  Code,  in 
particular,  is  hardly  intelligible  on  any  other  supposition. 
To  say  that  it  was  all  drawn  up  at  one  time  by  persons  set- 
ting themselves  to  the  systematic  work  of  framing  a  code 
without  written  materials  before  them,  is  to  ascribe  to 
the  writers  either  great  want  of  skill  on  tlie  one  theory, 
or  a  design  to  deceive  on  the  other.  In  view  of  the  only 
statements  which  the  Biblical  writers  themselves  make  on 
the  subject,  there  is  nothing  to  preclude  the  supposition 
of  various  editinc^s  of  the  laws  at  different  times,  while 
yet  the  system  as  a  whole,  and  even  the  three  separate 
Codes,  had  a  positive  basis  in  Mosaic  legislation. 

II.  This,  however,  does  not  satisfy  the  modern  critical 
writers.  They  think  they  can  prove,  by  a  comparison  of 
the  Codes,  and  by  references  to  history,  that  the  Codes 
belong  to  periods  very  far  apart.  This,  in  fact,  has  been 
a  great  part  of  the  laborious  task  of  Pentateuch  criticism  ; 
and  while,  on  the  one  hand,  it  has  been  claimed  that  by 
pure  literary  criticism  the  three  Codes  have  been  dis- 
tinguished from  one  another,  it  has  been  finally  con- 
fessed, on  the  other  hand,  that  the  order  of  the  Codes 


Ilistoriccd  Argument.  387 

and  tlieir  respective  dates  cannot  be  determined  solely 
from  the  Codes  themselves,  but  must  be  ascertained 
from  an  examination  of  the  historical  and  prophetical 
books  which  follow  them  in  the  Canon.  The  line  of 
ariiument  has  been  as  follows :  If  from  a  consideration 
of  the  books  relating  to  a  time  subsequent  to  Moses, 
we  find  a  state  of  matters  corresponding  with  the  re- 
quirements of  one  of  these  Codes,  it  is  concluded  that 
the  Code  in  question  was  known  and  recognised  and  in 
operation ;  if,  on  the  contrary,  the  state  of  matters  shows 
that  what  were  the  requirements  of  any  one  Code  were 
not  put  in  force,  and  were  ignored  not  only  by  the  people, 
but  by  the  religious  leaders  and  guides  of  the  people,  we 
conclude  that  such  a  Code,  not  receiving  official  recogni- 
tion, was  in  fact  non-existent.  According  to  this  prin- 
ciple, then,  it  is  argued  that  the  Deuteronomic  Code  was 
not  known,  and  therefore  was  not  existent  till  the  time  of 
Josiali;  because  up  to  that  time  not  only  the  nation  at 
large,  but  even  the  religious  teachers  of  the  nation,  openly 
and  without  compunction  practised  the  worship  of  Jahaveli 
at  the  high  places,  in  direct  contradiction  to  the  command 
reiterated  in  Deuteronomy,  that  there  was  to  be  a  central 
sanctuary,  at  which  alone  the  formal  rites  of  worship  were 
permissible.  In  the  same  way,  it  is  argued  that  the  dis- 
tinction of  priests  and  Levites  so  clearly  marked  in  the 
Levitical  Code  did  not  in  fact  come  into  existence  till 
after  the  Deuteronomic  Code;  that  many  of  the  laws 
contained  in  the  Levitical  Code  were  not  known,  and 
did  not  exist  till  the  time  of  Ezra ;  and  therefore  that 
the  Levitical  Code  as  a  whole  belongs  to  the  time  of 
Ezra,  or  even  a  subsequent  date.  The  order  of  the  Codes, 
therefore,  on  this  view,  is — Book  of  the  Covenant,  Deutero- 
nomic Code,  Levitical  Code,  and  they  are  separated  by  wide 


388  The  Three  Codes. 

distances;  for  whereas  the  hook  of  the  Covenant  helongs 
to  the  earliest  period  of  written  composition — the  century 
B.C.  850-750 — the  next  in  order,  the  Deuteronomic,  comes 
at  least  two  centuries  later — viz.,  in  621  B.C.;  and  the 
Levitical  Code,  if  placed,  at  the  earliest,  in  the  time  of 
Ezra,  falls  two  centuries  later  still — viz.,  ahout  444  B.C. 

It  does  not  require  to  be  said  that  there  is  no  direct 
historical  evidence  of  the  introduction  of  the  various  Codes 
at  the  dates  assigned.  It  is  by  a  process  of  inference 
from  the  history,  and  by  a  comparison  of  the  Codes,  that 
the  conclusions  are  reached  that  under  certain  definite  his- 
torical circumstances  each  successive  Code  was  introduced, 
and  that  certain  appreciable  influences  were  at  work  to 
bring  about  their  acceptance.  Let  us  therefore  look  a 
little  more  closely  at  wliat  the  position  implies,  and  how 
it  is  related  to  certain  admitted  facts. 

It  is  obvious  that  the  general  position  here  is  part  of  the 
whole  scheme  of  reconstructed  history,  according  to  which 
the  law  came  gradually  into  existence  and  authoritative 
recognition.  In  connection  with  this  part  of  the  argument, 
the  positions  considered  in  the  preceding  chapters  should 
be  borne  in  mind,  as  to  the  alleged  hasis  of  the  law  in  cus- 
tom and  in  spontaneous  nature  feasts,  because  we  ought 
now  to  find  some  precise  information  as  to  the  circum- 
stances that  led  to  the  stamping  of  custom  with  authority, 
and  the  transition  from  a  mere  nature  reference  to  re- 
ligious significance.  We  come,  in  fact,  face  to  face  with 
the  questions,  when  and  under  what  circumstances  the 
respective  laws  became  codified. 

Critical  writers  prefer  to  commence  their  investigations 
with  Deuteronomy;  we  prefer,  for  reasons  that  will  ap- 
pear, to  take  the  Codes  in  the  alleged  order  of  their 
promulgation.      Now  it  is  not  a  little  remarkable  that 


The  Book  of  the  Covenant,  389 

modern  critics,  while  they  tell  us  very  particularly  the 
historical  circumstances  under  which  the  Deuteronomic 
and  Priestly  Codes  were  produced,  can  tell  us  very  little 
about  the  earliest  of  all  the  Codes,  the  Jehovistic.  Yet 
this  is  the  very  one  which  we  should  think  must  have 
had  a  controlling  influence  on  subsequent  legislation  and 
codification.  Wellhausen,  it  will  be  remembered,'^  in  fix- 
ing the  period  at  which  Hebrew  literature  first  flourished, 
makes  this  collection  of  laws  contemporaneous  with  the 
earliest  historiography,  and  somewhat  earlier  than  the 
legends  about  the  patriarchs  and  primitive  times.  He 
says^  that  both  the  Jehovistic  law  and  the  Jehovistic 
narrative  "  obviously  belong  to  the  pre-prophetic  period  "  ; 
for  it  is  inconceivable  that  the  prophets  Hosea  or  Amos, 
or  any  like-minded  person,  could  glorify  (in  connection 
with  the  history  of  the  patriarchs)  the  local  sanctuaries 
in  the  way  that  these  narratives  do.  Therefore  at  some 
period  earlier  than  the  first  writing  prophets  —  earlier 
than  or  about  as  early  as  the  patriarchal  histories — "  cer- 
tain collections  of  laws  and  decisions  of  the  priests,  of 
which  we  have  an  example  in  Exodus  xxi.,  xxii.,  were 
committed  to  writing."  We  are  told  in  another  passage 
that  the  Jehovistic  history-book,  whose  character  is  best 
marked  by  the  story  of  the  patriarchs,  has  legislative 
elements  taken  "  into  it  only  at  one  point,  where  they  fit 
into  the  historical  connection — namely,  when  the  giving  of 
the  law  at  Sinai  is  spoken  of,  Exod.  xx.-xxiii.,  xxxiv."  (p.  7), 
although  soon  after  we  are  also  told  that  "  the  Jehovist 
does  not  even  pretend  to  being  a  Mosaic  law  of  any  kind ; 
it  aims  at  being  a  simple  book  of  history  "  (p.  9).  All  this 
throws  very  little  light  upon  this  first  collection  of  written 
laws ,  which,  one  would  have  thought,  was  epoch-making, 
i  The  passage  is  quoted  above  in  chap.  iii.  p,  60  f.      ^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  32. 


390  The  Three  Codes. 

Indeed  Wellliausen  goes  on  repeating  that  the  Torah  of 
Jehovah  still  continued  to  be  the  special  charge  of  the 
priests,  though  "it  was  not  even  now  a  code  or  law  in 
our  sense  of  the  word;  Jehovah  had  not  yet  made  His 
Testament ;  He  was  still  living  and  active  in  Israel ; 
.  .  .  the  Torah  had  still  occupation  enough,  the  pro- 
gressive life  of  the  nation  ever  affording  matter  for 
new  questions"  (p.  468).  And  as  to  the  outward  ob- 
servances of  religion,  we  are  told  "  the  cultus,  as  to 
place,  time,  matter,  and  form,  belonged  almost  entirely  to 
the  inheritance  which  Israel  had  received  from  Canaan ; 
to  distinguish  what  belonged  to  the  worship  of  Jehovah 
from  that  which  belonged  to  Baal  was  no  easy  matter" 
(p.  469). 

Now,  suppose  we  grant  that  the  book  of  the  Covenant 
was  codified  as  late  as  is  here  asserted,  it  bears  on  the  face 
of  it,  at  all  events,  a  testimony  to  Mosaic  authorship,  and 
authoritative  sanction,  and  has  a  strictly  religious  basis. 
It  is  misleading  in  Wellhausen  to  say  that  "  the  Jehovist 
does  not  even  pretend  to  being  a  Mosaic  law  of  any  kind." 
It  aims  at  being  a  true  history,  and  it  brings  in  this  Code 
under  definite  historical  conditions  as  given  by  Moses. 
What  more  do  the  writers  of  the  other  law-books  ?  More- 
over, to  whatever  extent  the  worship  may  have  followed 
Canaanite  practice,  a  sharp  line  is  drawn  here  between 
Mosaic  requirements  and  the  worship  .of  the  nations 
(Exod.  xxii.  20,  xxiii.  23  ff.)  Let  it  be  supposed  that  this 
Code  is  merely  the  embodiment  of  praxis  or  the  crystal- 
lisation of  custom — and  it  is  certainly  more — the  praxis 
or  custom  was  at  all  events  by  that  time  of  so  high  antiq- 
uity and  invested  with  such  authority  that  the  Code  was 
made  Mosaic ;  and  we  ask  the  critics  in  vain  for  an  ex- 
planation of  this  ascription  of  the  very  earliest  laws  to 


Idea  of  Codification  is  Ancient.  391 

a  time  so  long  antecedent,  and  to  circumstances  so  posi- 
tively historical. 

But  what  we  want  very  particularly  to  know  is  the 
occasion  that  at  this  precise  time  called  for  a  codification 
of  law  even  of  this  modest  compass.  What  set  the  pro- 
cess of  codification  agoing  at  least  two  centuries  before  it 
occurred  to  any  one  to  prepare  an  authoritative  book  of 
law  ?  For  this  is  the  way  in  which  Deuteronomy  is 
spoken  of :  "  The  idea  of  making  a  definite  formulated 
written  Torah  the  law  of  the  land  is  the  important  point ; 
it  [viz.,  the  Deuteronomic  Code]  was  a  first  attempt,  and 
succeeded  at  the  outset  beyond  expectation."  ^  This  book 
of  the  Covenant,  however,  shows  that  such  an  idea  is  much 
older,  though  the  fact  is  simply  slurred  over. 

Further,  if  this  Code  was  the  statement  of  the  legal 
customs  of  that  comparatively  late  time,  it  cannot  have 
been  the  statement  of  the  whole  of  them.  By  the  time 
assumed  the  national  life  had  taken  definite  form;  the 
Temple  of  Solomon  had  long  been  in  existence,  priests  as 
well  as  prophets  were  a  numerous  and  influential  class. 
The  mere  appearance  of  this  Code  at  what  is  called  the 
earliest  period  of  literary  composition  presupposes,  as  we 
have  argued,^  an  antecedent  education  and  a  literary 
activity  in  priestly  circles.  Thousands  of  cases  of  casu- 
istry, jurisprudence,  and  ceremony  had  arisen  and  been 
settled  in  some  way  before  the  time  this  Code  is  alleged 
to  have  existed.  At  length  (we  are  told)  it  had  oc- 
curred to  some  person  or  persons  to  draw  up  this  Code, 
brief  though  it  be,  in  all  the  sententiousness  of  this 
class  of  composition.  Now  it  does  seem  very  remark- 
able that,  a  beginning  having  been  made,  at  the  very 

^  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  402. 
^  See  above,  chap.  iv.  p.  1 05. 


392  The  Three  Codes. 

earlieat  period  of  written  composition,  the  thing  was 
entirely  discontinued  for  at  least  two  centuries,  and  that 
during  a  period  when  literary  composition  of  other 
kinds  attained  its  bloom;  at  a  time  too  when  the  civil, 
religious,  and  commercial  situations  of  the  people  were 
such  as  would  demand  authoritative  regulation  and  con- 
trol. A  glance  at  the  prescriptions  contained  in  the  book 
of  the  Covenant  will  show  that  it  contains,  though  in  a 
brief  and  germinal  manner,  legislation  in  all  the  directions 
that  are  followed  out  more  fully  in  the  larger  Codes,  and 
is  enough  to  suggest  the  hundreds  of  cases  and  relations 
similar  to  those  then  provided  for  that  must  have  arisen 
in  the  daily  life  of  the  people,  and  demanded  standing 
rules  for  their  settlement.  If  it  be  said  tliat  oral  teach- 
ing would  determine  all  these,  we  ask,  Why  were  not 
such  other  matters  as,  e.g.,  of  fire  arising  in  a  corn-field,  or 
of  an  ox  goring  a  man,  left  to  the  same  authority  ?  The 
marvellous  thing  is  that,  codification  having  begun,  even 
at  the  time  to  which  this  Code  is  assigned,  it  did  not  go 
pn.  Is  there  any  class  of  literature  more  voluminous, 
more  liable  to  grow  from  its  own  inherent  impulse,  than 
the  legal  ?  And  when  history,  prophecy,  poetry  flour- 
ished, when  every  kind  of  literature,  in  fact,  which  Israel 
produced  had  reached  its  best  before  the  time  of  Josiah, 
that  the  legal  and  ceremonial  should  have  once  taken  a 
start  and  then  stood  still  is  surely  something  which  it 
requires  the  faith  of  a  modern  critic  to  believe.  It  is 
much  more  probable  that  when  Hosea  speaks  of  the 
writing  of  ten  thousand  precepts,^  he  was  familiar  with 
and  alluded  to  a  literary  activity  in  this  field  of  com- 
position of  a  much  more  copious  extent  than  the  brief 
book  of  the  Covenant. 

^  See  above,  chap.  xiii.  p.  342. 


Dijffwultics  of  the  Modern  Theory^  393 

Difficulties  like  these,  arising  out  of  the  theory  so  far 
as  it  refers  to  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  suggest  other 
difficulties  in  connection  with  the  succeeding  Codes  and 
with  the  process  of  codification  in  general.  There  is,  for 
example,  the  difficulty  of  explaining  the  source  of  the 
laws  embodied  in  the  succeeding  Codes.  The  book  of 
Deuteronomy  contains  laws  that  relate  to  circumstances 
of  the  desert  life,  and  so  does  the  Levitical  Code.  Where 
were  these  laws  preserved  up  to  this  time,  if  they  had 
an  existence  at  all  ?  If  they  did  not  exist,  whence  came 
they  into  codes  which  were  for  quite  different  circum- 
stances ?  Again,  the  Code  of  Deuteronomy,  which  is  said 
to  have  been  introduced  for  the  specific  purpose  of  cen- 
tralising the  worship  at  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem,  is 
singularly  poor  in  regulations  for  ritual,  the  very  thing 
we  should  have  expected  to  be  attended  to,  when  a  multi- 
tude of  local  sanctuaries,  with  presumably  varying,  not 
to  say  corrupted,  worship,  were  abolished.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  Levitical  Code,  drawn  up,  as  is  alleged,  at  a 
time  when  the  Temple  was  in  ruins  and  ritual  worship 
impossible,  deals  above  all,  and  in  minutest  detail,  with 
ceremonial  matters.  One  naturally  asks.  What  was  the 
source  whence  came  the  ritual  and  ceremonial  laws  which 
bulk  so  largely  in  the  final  Code  of  Leviticus  ?  And  then, 
what  occurred  in  the  long  intervals  between  the  succes- 
sive Codes  ?  Were  these  Codes  sudden  appearances,  some- 
thing quite  new  for  their  respective  times,  or  did  they 
come  about  gradually  and  receive  acceptance  as  a  matter 
of  course  ? 

It  must  be  confessed  that  it  is  not  very  easy  to  follow 
the  reasoning  of  Wellhausen  in  his  treatment  of  these 
and  suchlike  questions,  for  he  seems  to  be  not  quite  con- 
sistent  with   himself   in   the   positions   he    takes  up   at 


394  The  Tliree  Codes. 

different  parts  of  his  argument.  For  example,  he  says 
at  one  time  that  "  proofs  of  the  existence  of  the  Priestly 
Code  [previous  to  the  exile]  are  not  to  be  found — not  a 
trace  of  them"  (p.  365);  that  the  Code  was  not  only  not 
operative,  but  "that  it  did  not  even  admit  of  being 
carried  into  effect  in  the  conditions  that  prevailed  pre- 
vious to  the  exile  "  (p.  12).  On  the  other  hand,  he  says 
that  the  "  real  point  at  issue  "  is  "  not  to  prove  that  the 
Mosaic  law  was  not  in  force  in  the  period  before  the 
exile;"  that  he  and  his  school  "do  not  go  so  far  as  to 
believe  that  the  Israelite  cultus  entered  the  world  of  a 
sudden — as  little  by  Ezekiel  or  by  Ezra  as  by  Moses ; " 
and  that  it  is  a  mistaken  assumption  that  on  the  modern 
hypothesis  "the  whole  cultus  was  invented  all  at  once 
by  the  Priestly  Code,  and  only  introduced  after  the  exile  " 
(p.  366).  In  brief,  he  sums  up  his  position  in  the  words 
which  he  prefixes  as  a  motto  to  the  first  part  of  his  book, 
"  These  having  not  the  law,  do  by  nature  the  works  of  the 
law."  If  this  merely  meant,  as  it  might  at  first  sight 
seem  to  mean,  that  the  respective  Codes  were  all  actually 
observed  in  some  form  previous  to  the  times  at  which 
they  are  said  to  have  been  introduced,  and  that  only  the 
loriting  of  them  in  the  forms  in  which  they  appear  was 
a  matter  of  later  date,  there  would  not  be  much  objection 
to  the  position ;  and  I  do  not  know  that  it  would  be  irre- 
concilable with  the  Biblical  theory ;  but  we  shall  see  that 
the  hypothesis  involves  a  much  more  serious  assumption. 
It  is  plain  that  for  the  establishment  of  Wellhausen's 
thesis  there  must  be  historical  proof  of  two  things:  (1) 
that  the  law,  as  expressed  in  the  Codes,  was  not  in  the 
possession  of  Israel  up  to  the  time  the  Codes  were  intro- 
duced, aocording  to  the  one  half  of  his  motto  —  "these 
having  not  the  law ; "  and  (2)  that  the  things  contained 


The  Argument  from  Silence.  395 

in  the  law,  the  works  of  the  law,  were  practised  by- 
nature —  i.e.y  without  prescription  —  before  these  dates. 
Attention  must  be  drawn  to  the  different  reference  of  the 
words  as  used  by  St  Paul  and  by  Wellhausen.  The 
apostle  is  speaking  not  of  a  ceremonial  or  ritual  law, 
but  of  moral  principles  "  written  on  the  heart,"  the  opera- 
tion of  which  can  be  traced  in  the  Gentile  world.  What 
Wellhausen  has  to  prove  is,  that  a  law  such  as  that 
contained  in  the  Priestly  Code  was  taught  by  nature  and 
practised  as  a  custom  by  Israel  before  its  details  were 
prescribed  by  any  authority, — a  very  different  matter. 

(1.)  For  the  establishment  of  the  first  position  reli- 
ance must  be  placed  for  the  most  part  on  the  argument 
from  silence,  as  it  is  called — i.e.,  if  the  thing  we  are  in 
search  of  is  not  mentioned,  particularly  if  it  is  not 
mentioned  where  we  should  look  for  it,  it  is  assumed 
that  the  thing  did  not  exist.  Wellhausen  objects  to  the 
process  followed  by  him  being  called  by  this  name,  and 
says,  "What  the  opponents  of  Graf's  hypothesis  call  its 
argument  ex  sileniio,  is  nothing  more  or  less  than  the 
universally  valid  method  of  historical  investigation "  (p. 
365).  One  would  think  it  depended  not  a  little  upon 
the  manner  and  the  extent  to  which  the  process  is 
carried  out ;  and  it  would  be  easy  to  illustrate  the  havoc 
that  might  be  made  in  general  history  by  a  reliance 
upon   this   argument.^     We   have   already   in   a   former 

^  Whately,  for  example,  in  his  'Historic  Doubts,'  draws  attention  to 
the  fact  that  the  principal  Parisian  journal  in  1814,  on  the  very  day  on 
which  the  Allied  armies  entei-ed  Paris  as  conquerors,  makes  no  mention  of 
any  such  event.  So,  too,  the  battle  of  Poictiers  in  732,  which  effectually 
checked  the  spread  of  Mohammedanism  across  Europe,  is  not  once  re- 
ferred to  in  the  monastic  annals  of  the  period.  Again,  Sir  Thomas 
Browne  lived  through  the  civil  wars  and  the  Commonwealtli ;  yet,  says 
a  biographer,  "  no  syllable  in  any  of  his  writings,  notwithstanding  their 
profound  and  penetrative  meditations  upon  vicissitudes  in  human  lives 


396  The  Three  Codes, 

chapter^  observed  the  significant  absence  of  all  reference  to 
education ;  and  in  regard  to  many  other  things,  we  are  left 
in  like  ignorance  by  the  Scriptural  writers.  Graphic  as 
their  descriptions  are  when  they  exist,  there  are  hundreds 
of  details  of  daily  life  and  ordinary  custom  in  regard  to 
which  we  would  fain  have  information.  The  prophet 
Isaiah,  in  one  well-known  passage,^  gives  a  complete  in- 
ventory of  the  wardrobe  of  a  fashionable  lady  of  Jeru- 
salem ;  but  a  great  number  of  the  words  he  employs  are 
found  only  in  that  passage,  and  are  such  that  we  can  only 
guess  at  the  precise  things  they  are  meant  to  signify. 
And  to  speak  more  particularly  of  customs  and  observ- 
ances, who  shall  describe  to  us,  from  information  drawn 
from  the  Biblical  books,  the  mode  in  which  the  Sabbath 
was  observed  in  the  time  of  the  prophets  ?  We  know 
from  their  references  to  it  ^  that  the  Sabbath  was  specially 
sacred;  and  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  at  the  latest, 
vouches  for  the  existence  of  the  Decalogue,  which  en- 
joins the  sanctity  of  the  Sabbath  :  yet  we  remain  in  almost 
total  ignorance  of  the  manner  in  which  its  sanctity  was 
preserved.  And  the  same  thing  holds  of  other  feasts, 
whether  we  regard  them  as  matters  of  custom  or  of  pre- 
scription. Things  of  daily  occurrence  and  of  standing  ob- 
servance, just  because  they  are  such,  are  most  naturally 
passed  by  without  notice.  It  is  perfectly  evident  that 
the  Old  Testament  writers  contemplated  as  their  readers 

and  empires,  betrays  the  least  partisanship  in  the  tragedy  enacted  on  the 
world's  great  stage  around  him."  And,  once  more,  Sale  notes  that  cir- 
cumcision is  held  by  the  Mohammedans  to  be  an  ancient  divine  institu- 
tion, the  rite  having  been  in  use  many  years  before  Mohammed  ;  and  yet 
it  is  not  so  much  as  once  mentioned  in  the  Koran. 

1  Chap.  iv.  p.  75.  2  ig^.  iii.  16-24. 

'^  Amos  viii.  5  ;  Hosea  ii.  11 ;  Isa.  i.  13  :  cf.  2  Kings  iv.  23,  xi.  5,  7,  9, 
xvi.  18. 


The  Great  Day  of  Atonement.  397 

those  who  were  familiar  with  the  most  familiar  things 
in  their  national  life  and  history.  As  for  Hebrew  prophets 
not  referring  to  legislative  books,  it  is  much  more  remark- 
able that  they  do  not  refer  to  prophetical  books,  and 
scarcely  make  a  quotation  from  one  another.  I  do  not 
know  that  we  have  positive  historical  evidence  (of  a  con- 
temporary kind)  that  would  establish  the  existence  of  the 
great  bulk  of  the  existing  prophetic  literature  before  the 
captivity;  and  quite  recently  a  French  critic ^  has  put 
forth  the  view  that  the  greater  part  of  the  literature  of  the 
Hebrews  is  a  free  creation  of  a  school  of  theologians  after 
the  restoration. 

A  mode  of  reasoning  like  this  can  be  tested  by  one 
striking  instance,  and  such  an  instance  is  furnished  in 
the  great  day  of  atonement  (Levit.  xvi.)  A  ceremonial  so 
imposing,  one  would  think,  would  not  pass  without  notice, 
and  the  modern  school  points  with  confidence  to  the  fact 
that  though  the  institution  bulks  so  largely  in  the  Leviti- 
cal  Code,  it  is  not  once  referred  to  in  the  pre-exilic  history, 
and  therefore  it  must  have  been  devised  first  of  all  by 
Ezra  or  his  successors.  But  the  instance  proves  too  much, 
for,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  there  is  no  positive  historical  ac- 
count of  the  observance  till  about  the  beginning  of  the 
Christian  era,  at  the  earliest  the  time  of  John  Hyrcanus  or 
even  Herod  the  Great,  37  B.C.,  a  date  at  which  it  was  im- 
possible that  the  prescription  of  the  ceremony  could  have 
been  inserted  in  the  Law  Code,  which,  according  to  Well- 
hausen,  was  introduced  in  B.C.  444.^ 

^  Maurice  Vernes,  Lea  R^sultats  de  I'Exdg^se  Biblique,  Paris,  1890. 

2  Delitzsch,  Peutateuch-Kritische  Studien  in  Luthardt's  Ztsch.  f.  Kirkl. 
Wissenschaft  und  Kirkl.  Leben,  1880,  p.  173  f.  ;  Dillmann,  Comm.  on  Lev., 
p.  525  ;  Bredenkamp,  Gesetz  u.  Proplieten,  p.  116.  The  fact  that  Ezekiel, 
in  his  [vision  of]  ritual,  does  not  mention  the  day  of  atonement,  is  taken 
by  the  critics  to  prove  that  he  was  not  aware  of  the  legislation  of  the 


398  The  Tliree  Codes. 

But,  indeed,  we  do  not  need  to  come  so  far  down  in 
history  for  evidence  that  the  non-observance  or  the 
absence  of  mention  of  a  law  is  not  a  proof  of  its  non- 
existence. On  the  position  of  the  modern  critical  writers, 
the  Jehovistic  book  of  the  Covenant  was  in  existence 
two  centuries  before  Deuteronomy.  And  yet,  not  to 
speak  of  the  moral  precepts  with  which  the  Code  is 
charged,  and  which  were  so  sadly  violated  in  the  life  of 
the  people,  can  distinct  proof  be  produced  that  the  Sab- 
batic year  prescribed  in  Exod.  xxiii.  10,  11,  or  even  the 
weekly  Sabbath  itself,  was  observed  in  the  time  during 
which  this  Code  is  said  to  have  been  the  sole  law-book  ? 
Why,  the  Deuteronomic  law  itself  was  systematically 
violated  after  the  time  of  Josiah.^  Down  even  in  the 
times  after  the  exile,  among  a  community  which  had 
learned  by  misfortune  the  evil  of  breaking  the  law,  and 
which  had  returned  through  hardship  to  set  up  a  new 
state  at  Jerusalem,  Ezra  and  Nehemiah  had  to  contend 
for  the  observance  of  the  most  fundamental  principles 
that  lay  not  only  at  the  basis  of  the  Deuteronomic  Code, 
but  at  the  foundation  of  Israel's  national  existence.^ 

So  far,  then,  as  the  first  part  of  Wellhausen's  thesis  is 
concerned,  it  cannot  be  sustained.  The  argument  from 
silence  does  not  prove  it,  since  we  know  that  many  things 

Priestly  Code  in  which  it  is  prescribed.  It  is  urged,  however,  in  reply, 
that  Ezekiel's  idea  of  a  double  atonement  for  the  sanctuary  (Ezek.  xlv. 
18-20)  may  be  an  intensification  of  the  atonement  required  in  the  Priestly 
Code.  And  Dillmann  remarks,  "  Why  Ezekiel  should  first  have  produced 
the  idea  of  such  an  atonement  is  not  at  all  apparent,  still  less  how  people 
of  a  later  time  ventured  to  hit  upon  quite  different  characteristics,  and  to 
give  out  these  as  Mosaic." 

^  Compare  Deut,  xv.  12  f.  with  Jer.  xxxiv.  13  f. 

-  Compare  Ezra  ix.  1,  2,  Neh.  x,  30,  xiii.  23,  with  Exod.  xxxiv.  16,  Deut. 
vii.  3.  Compare  also  Neh.  x.  31  with  Deut.  xv.  2  ;  and  Neh.  x.  37,  39, 
with  Deut.  xii.  17. 


Praxis  and  Programme.  399 

of  miicli  greater  significance  to  the  prophets  than  ritual 
are  not  mentioned  by  them.  The  argument  from  non- 
observance  does  not  prove  it,  since  the  Deuteronomic  and 
Levitical  Codes  themselves  were  broken  systematically 
after  the  admitted  dates  of  their  introduction.  And  the 
existence  of  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  or  even  of  such  a 
part  of  it  as  would  satisfy  Wellhausen's  own  account  of  its 
origin,  flatly  disproves  the  assertion  that  up  to  the  time  of 
Deuteronomy  the  Israelites  were  in  the  position  of  people 
"  having  no  law." 

(2.)  The  other  part  of  Wellhausen's  motto  that  has  to 
be  established  is,  that  Israel,  without  the  law,  did  the 
works  of  the  law  ;  in  other  words,  that  the  Codes  were  not 
suddenly  introduced.  On  this  subject,  the  use  of  the 
two  terms,  "praxis"  and  "programme,"  plays  a  prominent 
part  in  the  discussions;  and  we  can  understand  a  code 
coming  into  existence  by  either  process.  The  practice  or 
usage  of  the  time  is  systematised  more  or  less,  and  put 
down  in  the  form  of  prescription ;  this  is  the  codification 
of  praxis.  Or,  on  the  other  hand,  a  person  or  persons, 
considering  the  existing  state  of  matters  unsatisfactory 
or  insufficient,  may  devise  a  better  scheme,  and  set  it 
forth  in  orderly  form  as  a  legislative  programme.  It  is 
remarkable  how,  on  either  hypothesis,  the  critical  writers 
find  it  difficult  to  get  rid  of  the  postulate  of  Mosaic  legisla- 
tion, to  which  they  have  so  much  objection.  For  they  tell 
us  that  the  Deuteronomic  Code  was  a  programme  drawn 
up  by  prophets  and  priests  combined  for  the  centralisa- 
tion of  worship,  without  which  they  saw  there  could  be  no 
purity  of  worship.  It  could  not,  on  the  hypothesis,  have 
been  a  codification  of  the  praxis,  for  the  whole  drift  of  the 
theory  is,  that  up  to  the  introduction  of  this  Code,  worship 
at  any  place  was  the  practice.     Yet  the  men  who  brought 


400  The  Three  Codes, 

about  the  introduction  of  this  Code  were  the  Mosaic  party 
— the  party  who  strove  to  preserve  what  they  regarded  as 
the  true  religion  of  Israel, — and  they  appealed  to  Mosaic 
authority  in  ascribing  the  Code  to  him.  Wellhausen  gives 
us  to  understand  that  the  movement  for  centralisation 
was  connected  with  the  growth  of  monotheistic  concep- 
tions. In  all  this  there  is  a  testimony  to  the  fact  that 
Mosaism,  in  its  essence,  was  monotheistic,  and  that  the 
Deuteronomic  Code  rested  on  Mosaism  at  its  best,  to  such 
an  extent,  that  the  authority  of  Moses  had  to  be  invoked 
to  secure  its  acceptance,  i^gain,  Ezekiel  is  said  to  have 
put  forth  a  legislative  programme ;  this,  however,  he  did 
not  ascribe  to  Moses,  and  his  Code  was  not  adopted.  Was 
there  any  connection  between  the  two  things  ?  In  all  this 
talk  about  programme,  it  seems  to  me  the  critical  writers 
are  in  an  uncomfortable  dilemma.  Either  the  programme 
is  something  new,  and  then  their  position  that  the  law 
did  not  suddenly  come  into  force  becomes  untenable ;  or 
else  it  is  a  departure  in  the  spirit  of  the  Mosaic  legislation, 
which  amounts  to  the  Biblical  view  that  what  took  place 
was  a  reformation  of  the  worship,  not  an  innovation. 

The  same  perplexing  situation  arises  when  resort  is  had 
to  praxis  as  an  explanation  of  the  origin  of  the  Codes. 
This  is  particularly  the  case  with  the  Priestly  Code.  We 
are  told^  that  when  the  Temple  was  in  ruins,  and  there 
was  no  longer  a  possibility  of  the  worship  being  carried 
on,  a  body  of  men  in  the  captivity  set  themselves  to  a 
careful  study  of  the  praxis  as  it  had  been  carried  on, 
and  drew  up  wliat  their  memory  had  fondly  preserved 
of  the  cultus,  and  that  this  assumed  finally  the  form  of 
the  Priestly  Code.  The  question  at  once  occurs,  What 
praxis  ?     Was  the  worship   of   the   Temple,  as   Ezekiel 

1  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  pp.  59  f.,  404  f. 


The  Priestly  Code  and  Praxis.  401 

and  others  remembered  it,  of  the  pure  Mosaic  type  pre- 
scribed in  the  Code  which  men  of  his  spirit  elaborated  ? 
What  then  becomes  of  Wellhausen's  assertion  that  the 
observance  of  tlie  Priestly  Code  was  impossible  in  the 
conditions  prevailing  before  the  exile  ?  What  becomes 
also  of  all  the  burden  of  denunciation,  of  which  the  pro- 
phetic and  historical  books  are  full,  of  the  corruptions 
that  prevailed  ?  But  if  the  praxis  was  corrupt,  what 
guided  Ezekiel  and  Ezra  to  produce  a  Code  which  was  in 
"  the  spirit  of  the  Mosaic  legislation  "  ?  Again  we  fall 
back  upon  the  Mosaic  legislation,  which,  unless  we  are 
to  give  the  lie  to  all  history,  was  something  better  than 
the  corrupt  practice. 

Further,  if  the  critics  will  have  it  that  the  Priestly 
Code  is  a  codification  of  the  praxis,  we  may  employ  their 
own  argument,  and  ask  them  for  historical  proof  of  the 
praxis  of  anything  that  can  be  supposed  to  have  formed 
the  materials  of  the  new  Code.  Wellhausen  professes 
indeed  to  give  what  he  calls  "  a  sort  of  history  of  the 
ordinances  of  worship  ; "  but  he  is  constrained  to  add) 
"  Eude  and  colourless  that  history  must  be  confessed  to 
be — a  fault  due  to  the  materials,  which  hardly  allow  us 
to  do  more  than  mark  the  contrast  between  pre -exilic 
and  post -exilic,  and,  in  a  secondary  measure,  that  be- 
tween Deuteronomic  and  pre-Deuteronomic."  ^  Let  us, 
for  example,  take  the  three  great  feasts  of  the  Passover, 
Shebuoth  or  Weeks,  and  Tabernacles.  These,  as  agricul- 
tural feasts,  are  admitted  by  the  critics  to  date  back  to 
the  time  of  the  settlement  in  Canaan,  though  the  distinc- 
tive religious  or  national  character  attributed  to  them 
by  Biblical  writers  is  disputed.  Things  of  such  regular 
recurrence  could  not  be  kept  hid,  and  surely  here  the 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  13. 
2  C 


402  .  Tlie  Hiree  Codes. 

critical  canon  of  observance  may  be  applied.  Yet  we 
have  already  seen^  the  difficulty  Wellhansen  has  in  prov- 
ing their  existence ;  for  in  regard  to  the  celebration  of  the 
feasts  in  question  before  the  exile,  we  have  only  very  few 
notices,  and  these  mostly  very  slight.  The  observance  of 
all  the  three  is  only  mentioned  twice,  once  in  the  most 
general  terms  in  the  book  of  Kings  (1  Kings  ix.  25),  and 
again  in  the  parallel  passage  in  Chronicles  (a  book  on 
which  the  critics  are  wont  to  place  no  confidence),  where 
they  are  mentioned  by  their  usual  names  (2  Chron.  viii. 
13).  The  celebration  of  the  Passover  is  mentioned  at  most 
twice — viz.,  in  a  very  general  way,  if  it  is  this  feast  that 
is  referred  to,  in  Isa.  xxx.  29,  and  again  at  the  reforma- 
tion in  Josiah's  reign  (2  Kings  xxiii.  21  ff.)  Of  the  Feast 
of  Tabernacles  (Succoth)  we  have  four  notices — viz.,  two 
very  doubtful  ones  in  Judges  xxi.  19  and  1  Sam.  i.  20,  21 
and  another  two  very  general  references  in  1  Kings  viii. 
2,  xii.  32.  The  observance  of  the  Feast  of  Weeks  is  only 
once  mentioned,  and  that  is  in  2  Chron.  viii,  13,  where  it 
is  mentioned  with  the  other  two.  The  critics  are  in  the 
habit  of  making  light  of  the  statement  of  the  chronicler 
and  the  author  of  the  book  of  Kings,^  that  such  celebra- 
tions as  took  place  in  the  times  of  Hezekiah  and  Josiah 
had  not  been  seen  since  the  times  of  the  Judges,  or  in  all 
the  reigns  of  the  Kings.  This,  they  say,  amounts  simply 
to  the  fact  that  the  Passover,  as  enjoined  in  the  law,  had 
not  been  observed  at  all  till  the  late  period  to  which  the 
narrative  refers.^  But  in  view  of  the  paucity  of  refer* 
ences,  and  the  vagueness  of  the  references  which  have 

^  See  before,  chap.  xiv.  p.  374. 

-  2  Chron.  xxx.  5,  xxxv.  18,  with  2  Kings  xxiii.  22.     Cf.  Neh.  viii.  17. 
2  One  would  have  expected  of  the  chronicler,  if  he  was  such  a  stickler 
for  ceremonial,  and  so  unscrupulous  in  his  statements  of  their  earlier  ob- 


•  The  Place  of  Worship.  403 

been  pointed  out,  we  may  ask,  What  then  was  observed 
at  all  ?  What  proof  have  we  that  even  the  nature  feasts 
were  kept  up,  on  which  this  new  religious  observance 
miglit  be  grafted  ?  In  the  same  way  we  could  argue 
against  the  whole  "  praxis  "  of  which  so  much  is  said. 
We  have  no  more  evidence  of  the  existence  of  a  praxis 
which  could  be  subsequently  codified  than  we  have  of  the 
ordinances  which  are  prescribed  in  the  Codes ;  and  the 
passages  that  may  be  supposed  to  refer  to  a  cycle  of 
nature  feasts  may  as  well  be  taken  to  refer  to  the  legally 
sanctioned  observances. 

III.  Modern  critics,  however,  pronounce  the  Codes  to  be 
so  incompatible  on  vital  points  as  to  give  indication  that 
they  cannot  have  been  all  the  production  of  one  man,  or 
the  product  of  one  age.  On  one  subject,  in  particular,  it 
is  held  they  give  clear  evidence  of  a  progress  from  the 
simple  to  the  complex,  of  a  development  which  required 
centuries  to  accomplish,  and  that  subject  is  the  legislation 
relating  to  the  place  of  worship.  It  is  maintained  that 
the  book  of  the  Covenant  permits  sacrifice  anywhere,  or 
what  amounts  to  that ;  that  the  Deuteronomic  Code  pre- 
scribes one  central  sanctuary  ;  and  that  the  Levitical  Code 
makes  no  formal  prescription  on  the  subject,  taking  for 
granted  that  a  central  sanctuary  exists,  and  that  worship 
is  there  observed.  These  three  stages  of  legislation,  it  is 
maintained,  correspond  to  three  periods  in  Israel's  history. 
Up  to  the  time  of  Josiah  the  worship  of  the  Bamoth  or 
high  places,  up  and  down  the  land,  at  the  holy  places  con- 
secrated by  hallowed  associations,  was  the  rule  and  custom. 
Then  came  the  struggle  which  culminated  in  the  victory 

servance  as  the  critics  make  him  out  to  Le,  that  he  would  have  rather 
pointedly  told  us  how  faithfully  the  Passover  had  been  observed  all  along, 
than  give  this  intimation  that  it  had  been  persistently  neglected. 


404  The  Three  Codes.      •     - 

in  Josiali's  time,  when  the  high  places  were  abolished,  and 
the  legitimate  worship  confined  to  the  Temple.  And 
finally,  after  the  Temple  was  no  more,  and  the  people  in 
exile  had  time  to  reflect  on  the  privileges  they  had  lost, 
the  work  of  gathering  up  the  ritual  praxis  that  had  been 
observed  at  Jerusalem  was  undertaken;  and  when  the 
restored  community  returned  to  their  native  land,  they 
came  with  a  book  in  their  hand  regulating  the  service  of 
the  new  sanctuary,  the  book  being  the  Levitical  Code. 

It  will  be  observed  that  the  great  difference  on  this 
view  lies  between  the  book  of  the  Covenant  and  the 
Deuteronomic  Code;  and  as  the  primary  object  of  our 
inquiry  is  the  earlier  condition  of  things,  the  pre-prophetic 
and  early  prophetic  religion,  this  part  of  the  subject  de- 
mands more  attention.  The  difference  between  the  two 
Codes  in  question  is  not  one  that  resolves  itself  easily  into 
a  case  of  development,  for  the  introduction  of  the  Deu- 
teronomic Code  is  represented  as  having  been  effected  in 
fact  by  a  religious  revolution.  A  true  case  of  development 
would  be  that  centralisation  of  worship  was  the  idea  and 
the  ideal  from  the  first,  but  that  it  gained  realisation  by 
slow  degrees.  If  this  can  be  made  out  by  a  comparison  of 
the  Codes,  and  can  be  shown  to  be  borne  out  by  the  his- 
tory, the  objection  of  modern  critics  to  the  discrepancy  of 
the  Codes  will  have  comparatively  little  weight;  and  a 
development  of  the  proper  kind,  from  germ  to  full  mani- 
festation, will  be  established.  It  will  then  not  necessarily 
follow  that  the  Codes  are  far  distant  in  time;  or  if,  in 
their  final  form,  they  belong  to  periods  far  apart,  yet  they 
will  be  seen  in  the  essential  point  to  agree,  and  the  stronger 
emphasis  laid  by  the  Deuteronomic  Code  than  by  the  book 
of  the  Covenant  on  this  requirement,  will  be  explicable  on 
the  greater  fulness  of  the  longer  Code,  on  the  special  object 


The  Prophets  and  Multiplicity  of  Sanctuaries.       405 

which  it  aimed  at,  or  even  on  the  supposition  of  a  later 
editing  or  revision  of  it.  I  think  good  reasons  can  be 
given  for  taking  this  position: — 

(1.)  No  formal  sanction  is  given  by  prophetic  men  be- 
fore Josiah's  time  to  a  multiplicity  of  sanctuaries  in  the 
sense  in  which  the  modern  writers  speak.  When  Amos 
and  Hosea  speak  of  the  worship  performed  at  such  places 
as  Bethel  and  Gilgal,  there  is  nothing  in  their  words  to 
lead  us  to  suppose  that  these  places  were  regarded  by 
them  as  set  apart  by  any  divine  authority  as  places  of 
worship.  They  w^ere  certainly  invested  with  old  sacred 
associations  (every  country  has  such  places);  they  were 
certainly,  in  the  time  of  these  prophets,  resorted  to  for 
religious  purposes  by  the  people  generally,  but  the  pro- 
phets mention  them  for  the  purpose  of  rebuking  tlie 
idolatrous  or  corrupt  religious  observances  of  which  they 
were  the  seat,  and  never  are  such  expressions  applied  to 
them  as  to  Jerusalem  and  Zion.  It  is  quite  possible  that, 
in  the  northern  kingdom  after  the  schism,  such  places  as 
these,  hallowed  by  patriarchal  associations,  were  the  only 
places,  or  the  special  places,  at  which  those  who  wished  to 
sacrifice  to  Jahaveh,  debarred  from  attendance  at  Jeru- 
salem, performed  their  worship.  But  as  the  prophets 
recognised  only  the  Davidic  house  as  the  legitimate  de- 
pository of  the  monarchy,  so  they  regarded  Jerusalem  as 
the  seat  of  Jahaveh,  and  the  place  of  His  special  manifes- 
tation. The  very  first  words  which  Amos  utters  to  the 
people  of  the  northern  kingdom  are :  "  Jahaveh  shall  roar 
from  Zion,  and  utter  His  voice  from  Jerusalem  ; "  ^  words 
which  could  only  mean  that  from  Zion  and  Jerusalem  God's 
authority  was  in  a  special  way  manifested ;  that  there,  by 
pre-eminence,  His  presence  was  to  be  sought  and  His  law 

1  See  Note  XXVII. 


406  The  Three  Codes. 

to  be  found,  just  as  the  oracle  said,  "  Out  of  Zion  shall  go 
forth  the  law  "  (Isa.  ii.  2  ;  Micah  iv.  2).  Whatever  may  be 
said  of  sanctuaries  in  the  northern  kingdom,  there  is  no 
sanction  given  to  such  places  as  of  co-ordinate  authority 
with  Jerusalem.  Much  less  is  there  any  trace  of  the 
recognition  of  any  number  of  places  in  the  southern  king- 
dom, as  some  would  have  us  suppose,  which  were  regarded 
as  equally  sacred  with  Jerusalem. 

(2.)  Nor  does  the  history  prove  that  a  multiplicity  of 
sanctuaries,  in  the  modern  sense,  was  a  recognised  thing 
in  the  nation.  When  it  is  said  that  in  the  stories  of  the 
patriarchs  the  writers  represent  the  fathers  of  the  nation 
as  freely  erecting  an  altar  wherever  they  encamped,  and 
that  therefore  the  writer  of  these  stories  saw  nothinGj  wroncj 
in  this  proceeding,  there  is  surely  a  confusion  of  thought, 
or  a  false  inference,  when  it  is  concluded  that  in  the  writers' 
day  a  multiplicity  of  sanctuaries  was  recognised.  Tor 
how,  indeed,  could  the  patriarchs  have  sacrificed  at  all, 
except  in  the  manner  indicated  ?  There  was  to  them  no 
law  of  central  sanctuary,  and  the  writer  of  these  accounts 
simply  represents  the  patriarchs  as  doing  the  only  thing 
that  it  was  possible  for  them  to  do.  If  the  writer  knew 
of  the  law  of  a  central  sanctuary,  he  could  not  have 
blamed  the  patriarchs  for  ignoring  it,  simply  because  it 
did  not  exist  in  their  day.  Of  course  the  contention  is 
that  the  writer  knew  nothing  at  all  about  the  worship  of 
Abraham  and  the  other  patriarchs,  but  simply  projected 
into  the  past  the  ideas  and  practices  of  his  own  time,  and 
made  them  do  sacrifice  at  the  various  places  which  in  the 
writer's  day  were  resorted  to  as  sanctuaries.  But  all  this 
is  mere  assumption.  The  cases  referred  to  of  Samuel  and 
the  Judges,  who  are  described  as  offering  sacrifices  at 
various  places,  are  not  more  conclusive  on  the  point  iu 


Place  of  Worship  in  Boole  of  the  Covenant.         407 

hand.  The  places  at  which  such  sacrifices  are  offered  are 
not  regarded  by  the  writers  as  places  sacred  in  them- 
selves ;  nay,  they  are  mentioned  generally  only  on  the 
special  occasions  on  which  sacrifice  was  performed  at 
them,  and  again  disappear  from  the  history.  There  is 
always  some  special  reason  for  the  performance  of  the 
sacrifice ;  there  is  not  one  of  them  that  is  spoken  of  as 
habitually  the  seat  of  worship,  except  Shiloli,  which  was 
consecrated  by  the  presence  of  the  ark,  and  which  was, 
so  long  as  it  stood,  the  central  sanctuary  of  Israel.  That 
it  was  so  regarded  as  the  predecessor  of  Jerusalem  itself 
is  proved  by  the  reference  to  it  so  late  as  the  time  of 
Jeremiah  (vii.  12),  a  reference  which  shows  that  the  nation 
had  regarded  it  as,  for  its  time,  similar  to  the  sanctuary  at 
Jerusalem  in  the  days  of  its  glory. 

(3.)  Moreover,  the  ideal  even  in  the  book  of  the  Covenant 
is  that  of  a  central  sanctuary.  Much  has  been  made  here 
of  the  words,  "  In  every  place  where  I  record  my  name,  I 
will  come  unto  thee,  and  I  will  bless  thee  "  (Exod.  xx.  24), 
which  have  been  taken  to  mean  a  permission  to  worship 
indifferently  at  any  place.  Wellhausen  indeed  makes  a 
sliow  of  meeting  the  limitation  expressed  in  the  words 
"  where  I  record  my  name  " ;  but  all  he  can  say  ^  in  ex- 
planation of  them  is,  "that  the  spots  where  intercourse 
between  earth  and  heaven  took  place  were  not  willingly 
regarded  as  arbitrarily  chosen,  but,  on  the  contrary,  were 
considered  as  having  been  somehow  or  other  selected  by 
the  Deity  Himself  for  His  service,"  wliich  is  simply  saying 
nothing.  The  promise  here  given  must  be  taken  to  mean 
something  of  a  positive  kind,  and  coming  after  the  direc- 
tion how  to  make  the  altar,  must  be  supposed  to  have 
some   reference   to   worship.      If,   after   the    manner  oi 

^  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  30. 


408  '  The  Three  Codes. 

modern  critics,  we  were  to  ask  the  polemic  the  words 
imply,  it  might  ahnost  seem,  on  their  mode  of  reasoning, 
that  the  writer  of  these  words  was  protesting  against  such 
a  centralising  of  worship  as  took  place  in  Josiah's  days !  ^ 
At  all  events,  it  seems  strange  that  such  a  permission  to 
worship  anywhere  should  be  given  in  this  formal  way  at 
a  time  when,  it  is  alleged,  no  one  dreamed  of  doing  any- 
thing else,  for  the  book  of  the  Covenant  dates  (on  the 
hypothesis)  from  the  earliest  writing  period,  when  the  law 
of  a  central  sanctuary  was  unknown.^  If  the  words  were 
meant  merely  to  sanction  places  which  had  been  elevated 
into  sacredness  by  association  with  patriarchal  theophanies 
and  the  like,  they  might  be  urged  as  an  argument  for  the 
worship  at  a  certain  number  of  places ;  but  this  is  less 
than  what  the  words  express,  and  less  than  the  example 
of  the  patriarchs  would  warrant,  for  they  seem  to  have 
erected  an  altar  as  a  matter  of  course  wherever  they 
went.^  And  if  the  words  are  really  intended  to  mean 
that  Jahaveh  may  be  worshipped  anywhere,  in  the  sense 
that  "a  multiplicity  of  altars  was  assumed  as  a  matter  of 
course,"  *  it  may  be  objected  that  this  is  hardly  consistent 
with  the  materialistic  conception  of  the  national  God 
which  is  ascribed  to  Israel.     One  would  have  expected 

^  I  see  that  Wellhausen  notes  that  "  Exod.  xx.  24-26  looks  almost  like 
a  protest  against  the  arrangements  of  the  Temple  of  Solomon,  especially 
V.  26."— Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  96,  footnote. 

2  So  that  we  have  here  something  very  like  "a  positive  statement  of 
the  non-existence  of  what  had  not  yet  come  into  being,"  which  Well- 
hausen thinks  it  so  unreasonable  to  ask. — Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  365. 

2  Wellhausen,  however,  says  that  they  did  not  worship  at  indifferent 
and  casual  localities,  but  at  famous  and  immemorially  holy  places  of  wor- 
ship ;  which  is  just  assuming  his  hypothesis. — Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  30. 
This  is  also  the  view  Stade  takes,  connecting  these  sites  with  the  worship 
of  ancestors. 

^  Wellhausen,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  29. 


Tlie  Coverucnt  hefore  the  Law.  409 

that,  at  a  period  when  Jahaveh  was  no  more  than  a 
national  God,  as  the  theory  maintains,  the  tendency  would 
be  to  a  narrow  centralising  of  worship,  or  at  least  to  a 
worship  in  regularly  authorised  places;  and  that,  when 
once  "ethic  monotheism"  was  reached,  a  free  and  more 
unrestricted  worship  would  be  permissible.  But  this  is 
another  of  the  many  perplexities  of  the  modern  theory, 
that  the  development  was  quite  the  other  way. 

As  it  stands,  the  book  of  the  Covenant  is  represented  as 
antecedent  to  the  appointment  of  the  tabernacle  in  the 
wilderness,  and  may  therefore  be  taken  as  meant  to  state 
the  fundamental  idea  of  worship  that  was  inculcated  upon 
Israel.  As  the  Covenant  precedes  the  law  and  is  not 
annulled  by  it  (Gal.  iii.  17),  this  more  spiritual  conception 
of  God,  as  ever  near  to  the  worshipper  who  seeks  Him 
in  the  right  way,  represents  the  idea  that  we  find  every- 
where held  by  prophetic  men.  It  was  a  protest,  or 
polemic,  if  we  may  so  say,  against  the  localising  ten- 
dencies of  other  religions,  an  assurance  that  the  God  of 
Israel  could  and  would  come  near  to  bless  His  people  in 
every  place  where  He  recorded  His  name.  It  thus  formed 
the  guiding  principle  of  prophetic  men,  to  whom,  as  it 
would  seem,  the  ordinances  of  ritual  worship  were  "  a 
figure  for  the  time  present,"  and  who  never  allowed  them- 
selves to  fall  into  the  belief  that  their  God  was  confined 
to  temples  made  with  hands.  Had  there  not  been  such 
an  assertion  of  this  fundamental  principle  in  the  very 
earliest  legislation — the  omnipresence  of  Jahaveh — we 
should  no  doubt  have  been  told  by  modern  critics  that 
this  is  another  proof  that  at  this  early  stage  of  religious 
belief  He  was  conceived  of  as  limited  to  some  high  moun- 
tain, or  accessible  only  in  some  special  sanctuary.  The 
duty  of  united  worship  in  a  central  place  is  not  incom- 


410  The  Three  Codes. 

patible  with  God's  power  to  bless  anywhere.  The  book 
of  Deuteronomy  itself,  which  is  said  to  restrict  worship 
to  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem,  contains  an  injunction  to  set 
up  an  altar  and  offer  sacrifices  between  Ebal  and  Gerizim 
(Deut.  xi.  29 ;  xxvii.  4,  13).  Still  the  limitation  stands, 
"in  every  place  where  I  record  my  name,"  which  can- 
not simply  mean  "  in  all  places  indifferently."  There 
was  to  be  some  indication  of  Jahaveli's  name  given  by 
Himself ;  and  after  all,  the  old  explanation  that  saw 
a  reference  to  the  movements  of  the  tribes  throudi  the 
wilderness,  under  the  direction  of  God,  who  appointed 
their  halting-places,  and  to  a  time  before  the  tribes  were 
a  settled  people  with  fixed  dwelling-place,  though  it 
does  not  seem  to  exhaust  the  reference,  is  not  inappro- 
priate. At  most  the  words  may  imply  the  acceptable 
worship  of  Jahaveh  at  a  number  of  successive  places, 
but  they  do  not  necessarily,  nor  perhaps  possibly,  imply 
the  recognition  of  simultaneous  sanctuaries  in  different 
places.  With  this  idea  tlie  whole  tone  of  the  passage  is 
at  variance.  The  people  to  whom  the  words  are  ad- 
dressed are  one  people;  it  is  not  to  individuals  that  tlie 
permission  or  promise  is  given.^  Wherever  Israel  as  a 
whole  is,  and  wherever  Jahaveh,  their  one  God,  records 
His  name,  there  acceptable  worship  may  be  offered.     The 

^  The  ten  commandments,  says  a  very  docile  pupil  of  Wellhausen, 
"  are  not  addressed  to  individuals,  but  to  a  nation.  The  *  thou '  to 
whom  they  speak  is  the  people  of  Israel,  and  they  are  prefaced  by  a 
sentence  in  which  Jehovah  states  how  it  is  His  right  to  give  laws  to 
Israel"  (Allan  Menzies,  National  Keligion,  p.  42).  Wellhausen  would 
have  us  believe  that  the  notion  of  the  "  congregation  "  as  a  sacred  body 
was  "  foreign  to  Hebrew  antiquity,  but  runs  through  the  Priestly  Code 
from  beginning  to  end  "  (Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  78).  I  think  we  have  it  here 
clearly  marked  in  the  "  thou  "  of  the  book  of  the  Covenant  in  formal  con- 
nection with  worship  (comp.  above,  p.  303  f.)  But  indeed  it  was  present 
in  essence  in  the  first  self-consciousness  of  Israel  as  Jahaveh's  people. 


One  God,  one  People,  one  Altar.  411 

very  idea  of  the  unity  of  the  national  God,  and  the  cor- 
relative idea  of  the  unity  of  His  people,  imply  a  unity  of 
worship  and  of  sanctuary.  The  corporate  reference  is 
confirmed  by  the  fact  that  this  same  book  of  the  Cov- 
enant ordains  that  three  times  in  the  year  all  the  males 
should  appear  before  Jahaveh.  It  is  inconsistent  witli 
the  fundamental  ideas  of  the  unity  of  the  tribes  at  tliat 
early  time  to  suppose  that  such  a  command  could  mean 
that  three  times  in  the  year  all  males  were  to  make  a 
pilgrimage  to  some  shrine  or  other,  some  tomb  or  holy 
place  of  a  tribal  ancestor,  and  thus  fulfil  the  command 
here  given.  The  mere  possession  of  a  sacred  ark,  with 
a  tent  for  its  habitation,  and  these  as  the  common  posses- 
sion of  all  the  tribes,  was  in  itself  a  centralising  of  wor- 
ship. Though  the  existence  of  a  tabernacle  such  as  is 
described  in  the  Pentateuch  is  denied  by  the  modern 
historians,  it  is  not  denied  that  an  ark,  and  a  tent  for  its 
covering,  were  in  the  possession  of  Israel,  and  held  in 
general  regard  in  connection  with  the  Jahaveh  religion. 
Nor  can  it  be  denied  that  Shiloh  was  a  sanctuary  of  a 
quite  special  importance  in  the  times  of  the  Judges  and 
Samuel,  and  no  one  who  believes  that  the  Hebrew  writ- 
ers knew  anything  at  all  of  their  history  will  accept  the 
assumption  that  the  Temple  was  merely  the  court  sanctu- 
ary of  the  kingdom  of  Judah,  or  even  only  one  of  many  co- 
ordinate holy  places  in  that  kingdom.  Wellhausen  says  ^ 
that  the  principle  "  one  God,  one  sanctuary  "  is  the  idea 
of  the  Priestly  Code.  It  is,  in  point  of  fact,  the  idea  of 
the  book  of  the  Covenant  also,  though  neither  in  the  one 
nor  in  the  otlier  is  it  held  to  mean  that  the  one  God  was 
only  present,  and  could  only  manifest  His  power  at  one 
particular  spot.     "An  altar  shalt  thou  make  to  me,"  the 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  34. 


412  The  Three  Codes. 

command  runs,  not  "  altars."  The  altar  of  God  is  always 
only  one.  It  ceases  to  be  an  altar  the  moment  His  people 
and  His  manifestation  to  them  are  at  another  place.  It 
is  not  the  sanctity  of  the  place  that  constitutes  the  sanc- 
tity of  the  altar,  but  the  presence  of  Him  who  makes  His 
name  manifest.  It  is  remarkable  that  we  do  not  find  in 
all  the  Old  Testament  such  a  divine  utterance  as  "my 
altars  " ;  and  only  twice  does  the  expression  "  Thy  altars," 
addressed  to  God,  occur.  It  is  found  in  Elijah's  complaint, 
which  refers  to  northern  Israel,  at  a  time  when  the  legit- 
imate worship  of  Jerusalem  was  excluded ;  and  in  Psalm 
Ixxxiv.,  where  it  again  occurs,  no  inference  can  be  drawn 
from  it.  On  the  other  hand,  Hosea  says  distinctly, 
''Ephraim  hath  multiplied  altars  to  sin"  (Hosea  viii.  11). 

I  think,  therefore,  it  is  not  proved  that  the  book  of  the 
Covenant  allows  worship  at  any  indefinite  number  of 
places  as  co-ordinate  sanctuaries ;  nor  does  the  history 
show  that  this  was  recognised  by  the  religious  leaders  of 
the  nation.  Previous  to  the  building  of  the  Temple  at 
Jerusalem,  and  especially  when  the  ark  was  removed 
from  Shiloh,  we  find  what  may  be  called  a  freer  or 
less  regulated  practice;  and  this  was  the  result  of  the 
exigencies  of  the  period.  But  from  the  erection  of  the 
Temple,  not  only  is  there  no  proof  that  any  other  sanc- 
tuary was  allowed,  but  there  are  positive  indications  that 
that  was  regarded  as  the  one  authoritative  place  of  wor- 
ship in  the  sense  in  which  we  here  speak.  The  practice 
in  the  northern  kingdom  proves  nothing,  for  all  the  asser- 
tions of  modern  writers  to  the  effect  that  the  history 
mainly  evolved  itself  there,  and  that  the  kingdom  of 
Judah  counts  for  little,  are  opposed  to  the  spirit  and 
distinct  utterances  of  the  earliest  prophets.  Not  less  are 
tliey  inconsistent  with  the  earliest  legislation.     The  book 


^TJ5IVB.r. 


One  Law  for  all  Israel. 


of  the  Covenant,  at  whatever  time  written,  and  whether 
composed  in  the  northern  or  the  southern  kingdom,  makes 
no  distinction  between  the  two,  and  lays  down  one  law 
for  all  Israel.  The  schism  of  the  ten  tribes  was  a  break- 
ing away  from  national  unity  and  from  the  national  God; 
and  no  proof  can  be  adduced  that  prophetic  men  looked 
with  anything  but  disfavour  on  the  idolatrous  worship 
that  was  practised  in  the  southern  kingdom,  whether  at 
Jerusalem  or  at  local  sanctuaries. 


4U 


CHAPTEK    XVI. 

THE   LAW-BOOKS. 

Distinction  of  JOools  and  Codes — Wcllhausen's  personal  experience — The 
hypotheses  of  Graf;  not  the  result  of  criticism — The  great  objection  to 
it  its  assumption  of  the  fictitious  character  of  the  history,  thus  leaving 
no  solid  materials  for  a  credible  history — /.  The  book  of  Deuteronomy 
is  neither  (1)  pseudonymous  nor  (2)  fictitious— II^  The  dooks  contain- 
ing  the  Levitical  Code — (1)  The  position  that  Ezekiel  paved  the  way  for 
this  Code — (2)  The  pious  remnant  and  the  reformation  ideas — (3)  Ficti- 
tious history  in  an  aggravated  form — (4)  The  literary  form  of  this  Code 
— Multiplicity  of  sources  a  proof  of  long -continued  literary  activity — 
But  the  main  course  of  the  history  rests  on  its  own  independent  proofs. 

In  the  preceding  chapters  we  have  seen  reasons  for  con- 
cluding that  the  modern  theory  does  not  sufficiently 
account  for  the  persistent  ascription  of  law  and  religious 
ordinance  to  Moses ;  that  it  fails  to  exhibit  the  transition 
from  natural  to  religious  observance,  and  from  oral  to 
authoritative  written  law  ;  that  its  argument  from  silence 
tells  as  much  against  its  own  assumption  as  against  the 
Biblical  view ;  and  that  its  sharp  distinction  of  the  Codes 
in  essential  matters  is  not  well  founded.  With  the  liter- 
ary fates  of  the  various  law-codes  we  are  not  much  con- 
cerned, because  this  is  a  subject  on  which  the  Biblical 
theory,  which  it  is  our  main  purpose  to  test,  leaves  great 


Wcllhausens  early  Experience.  415 

latitude  for  different  views;  and  the  same  may  be  said 
of  the  question  of  the  composition  of  books.  We  must, 
however,  look  somewhat  particularly  into  the  relation  of 
the  law-books  to  the  Codes  and  to  the  general  history; 
for  in  regard  to  this  matter  the  Biblical  theory  and  the 
modern  are  radically  at  variance  in  important  points. 

Wellhausen  in  one  passage  ^  gives  us  an  interesting 
piece  of  his  own  personal  experience.  He  tells  us  that 
in  his  early  student  days  he  "  was  attracted  by  the  stories 
of  Saul  and  David,  Ahab  and  Elijah ; "  that  the  discourses 
of  Amos  and  Isaiah  laid  strong  hold  on  him,  and  that  he 
read  himself  well  into  the  prophetic  and  historical  books 
of  the  Old  Testament ;  but  that  all  the  time  he  "  was 
troubled  with  a  bad  conscience,  as  if  he  were  beQ^innins 
with  the  roof  instead  of  the  foundation."  At  last  he  took 
courage,  and  made  his  way  through  the  books  of  Exodus, 
Leviticus,  and  Numbers ;  but  looked  in  vain  for  the  light 
which  he  expected  these  would  shed  on  the  historical 
and  prophetical  books.  "  At  last,"  he  says,  "  in  the 
course  of  a  casual  visit  in  Gottingen  in  the  summer  of 
1867, 1  learned  through  Eitschl  that  Karl  Heinrich  Graf 
placed  the  law  later  than  the  prophets,  and,  almost  with- 
out knowing  his  reasons  for  the  hypothesis,  I  was  pre- 
pared to  accept  it ;  I  readily  acknowledged  to  myself  the 
possibility  of  understanding  Hebrew  antiquity  without 
the  book  of  the  Torah." 

So  far  as  his  experience  in  the  reading  of  Scripture 
goes,  there  is  nothing  very  peculiar  in  it.  I  suppose  that 
few  of  those  who  have  formed  for  themselves  any  defined 
view  of  Bible  history,  have  acquired  this  by  reading 
through  the  law-books  before  approaching  those  that  are 
historical.     He  tells  us  nothing  of  his  experience  in  re- 

Hist,  of  Israel,  pp.  3,  4. 


416  The  Law-Boohs. 

gard  to  the  book  of  Genesis,  whose  stories  of  the  patri- 
archs, one  would  have  thought,  would  have  as  powerfully 
attracted  the  young  student  as  the  history  of  Saul  and 
David ;  and  it  is  difficult  to  fancy  what  idea  he  could  have 
obtained  of  even  the  historical  and  prophetical  books, 
without  accepting  the  underlying  assumption  of  these 
books  that  the  history  went  back  to  the  patriarchal 
period.  The  whole  history  hangs  in  the  air,  if  we  begin 
with  Saul  and  David — implying,  as  it  does,  a  great  deal 
for  which  we  must  turn  to  the  writings  which  Wellhausen 
must  include  in  his  expression,  "  the  book  of  the  Torah." 
But  in  using  this  expression,  and  in  his  reference  to  the 
theory  of  Graf  which  he  says  he  found  himself  ready  to 
accept,  he  leads  the  unwary  reader  to  confuse  two  things 
which  ought  to  be  kept  distinct,  and  to  jump  to  a  con- 
clusion which  is  not  warranted  by  the  experience  which 
he  relates. 

Our  examination  of  the  early  prophetical  writings,  and 
of  the  histories  which  are  said  to  be  of  about  the  same 
date,  always  threw  us  back  upon  an  antecedent  history, 
and  gave  at  least  a  strong  presumption  of  the  truth  of  the 
narrative  contained  in  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch.  Yet 
for  the  fundamental  facts  and  main  course  of  the  history 
we  did  not  require  to  refer  to  the  Pentateuchal  laws,  al- 
though we  found  a  coherence  and  consistency  between  the 
accounts  contained  in  the  two  sets  of  books.  The  history, 
in  fact,  does  not  turn  upon  laws  and  the  observance  of 
ceremonies,  and  so  far  it  is  true,  as  Wellhausen  says  he 
experienced  it,  that  the  history  is  intelligible  without  the 
Torah.  But  in  saying  "  the  book  of  the  Torah,"  if  by  that 
he  means  the  whole  Pentateuch,  and  not  merely  the  legal 
part  of  it,  it  is  not  the  case  that  the  history  is  thus 
intelligible. 


Narrative  and  Legislation  in  the  Pentateuch.        417 

The  law-books  of  the  Pentateuch,  as  is  well  known, 
exhibit  two  component  elements, — narrative  and  legisla- 
tion ;  and  it  has  been  found  impossible  by  literary  analysis 
to  separate  them.  Whether  the  two  parts  originally  came 
from  different  hands  or  not,  in  part  or  in  whole,  they  are 
so  inextricably  blended  or  woven  together  that  it  has  to 
be  confessed  they  must  go  together.  That  is  to  say,  the 
narratives  imply  that  the  laws  were  given  under  historical 
circumstances,  and  the  laws  imply  the  circumstances  under 
which  they  were  given.  If,  then,  we  are  satisfied  with  the 
testimony  given  by  later  writers  to  the  history ;  if,  in  other 
words,  we  take  the  references  to  earlier  times  contained  in 
the  writings  of  the  eighth  and  ninth  centuries  as  confirm- 
ing, in  the  main,  the  narrative  of  the  Pentateuch,  we  might 
conclude  that  the  laws,  which  are  by  confession  bound  so 
closely  in  the  bundle  of  narrative  as  to  be  inseparable  from 
it,  are  also  the  laws  and  statutes  to  which  the  prophets  ap- 
peal. The  laws  would  go  with  the  narrative,  in  which  they 
are  enclosed.  And  this  is  what  the  Old  Testament  writers 
take  for  granted.  The  reverse  process,  however,  since  the 
time  of  Graf,  has  been  followed  by  those  who  advocate 
his  theory.  They  say  the  narratives  must  follow  the  laws. 
How  this  conclusion  was  reached,  and  what  it  involves, 
must  now  be  considered. 

Graf  at  first  attempted  to  make  a  separation  between 
the  legislation  and  the  accompanying  history  contained  in 
the  Pentateuch ;  and  having  proved  to  his  own  satisfaction 
that  the  narratives  attached  to  the  Levitical  Code  were 
Implied  in  the  book  of  Deuteronomy,  and  known  to  the 
writer  of  the  latter,  he  said  that  the  narratives  were  early, 
while  the  legislation  was  late.  Being,  however,  afterwards 
convinced  that  the  two  elements  were  inseparable,  he  was 
clearly  in  a  dilemma,  from  which  he  adopted  a  remarkable 

2  D 


418  The  Law-Boohs. 

mode  of  escape.  He  simply  said  that  as  the  laws  had 
been  proved  to  be  of  late  origin,  the  narratives  must  also 
be  of  late  composition — throwing  over  entirely  the  proofs 
which  he  had  before  considered  sufficient  to  show  that  the 
narratives  of  the  Levitical  books  were  older  than  Deuter- 
onomy, and  introducing  a  fashion  of  regarding  the  contents 
of  these  books  which  is  at  once  novel  and  startling.  For 
if  the  laws  of  tlie  Levitical  Code  are  late  in  the  literal 
sense  that  they  became  laws  at  a  period  as  late  as  Ezra, 
the  narratives  which  accompany  them  and  describe  in 
detail  in  regard  to  many  of  them  the  manner  in  whicli 
they  were  promulgated  by  Moses,  cannot  be  true  history 
at  all :  the  events  related  as  the  historical  setting  of  the 
laws  must  be  nothing  else  than  fictitious.  The  only  thing 
that  can  be  said  in  their  favour  is,  that  they  were  invented 
for  the  good  purpose  of  confirming  and  sanctioning  the 
laws,  by  ascribing  them  to  ]Moses,  to  whom  the  national 
tradition  looked  back  as  the  great  originator  of  law  in 
Israel. 

The  first  thing  that  strikes  one  here  is  that  the  theory  is 
not  the  result  of  a  sustained  and  uniform  line  of  criticism. 
It  was  a  volte-face.  Graf  had  satisfied  himself  that  the 
narrative  parts  of  the  Pentateucli  were  early,  and  were 
referred  to  or  implied  in  pre-exilian  writings.  If  he  was 
equally  satisfied  that  the  laws  were  exilic,  or  post-exilic, 
and  yet  were  inseparable  from  the  narrative,  the  proper 
conclusion  was  that  his  critical  processes  were  incorrect 
somewhere,  and  he  ouglit  to  have  searched  for  the  error. 
One  would  think  that  the  national  testimony  to  a  series  of 
historical  facts  would  be  more  clear  than  the  recollection 
of  a  body  of  laws,  and  that  laws  were  more  liable  to  change 
by  usage  than  the  national  testimony  to  vary  in  regard  to 
fundamental  facts  of  history.    At  all  events,  to  say  bluntly 


Bewlutionary  Hypothesis.  419 

that  the  narratives  must  go  with  the  laws  is  no  more  a 
process  of  criticism  than  to  say  that  the  laws  must  go 
with  the  history.  It  is  therefore  inaccurate  to  describe 
the  position  of  Graf  as  a  conclusion  of  criticism.  It  was 
simply  a  hypothesis  to  evade  a  difficulty  in  which  criti- 
cism had  landed  him. 

And  then,  when  it  is  considered  what  is  implied  in  the 
position  that  the  narratives  must  go  with  the  laws,  it 
cannot  but  be  admitted  that  the  hypothesis  is  so  far-reach- 
ing and  i-evolutionary  that  it  should  be  accepted  only  when 
every  other  explanation  of  the  phenomena  fails.  For  it 
amounts  to  a  thorough  discrediting  of  the  historical  value 
of  the  narratives  of  these  books  with  which  the  laws  are 
so  closely  interwoven ;  and  to  an  ascription  of  fiction,  if  not 
fraud,  to  the  writers,  which  will  render  it  extremely  diffi- 
cult for  sober  criticism  to  rely  upon  any  testimony  which 
is  borne  by  the  Hebrew  writers  to  the  facts  of  their 
national  history.  So  that  here  again,  when  pushed  home 
to  its  central  position,  we  find  that  the  modern  view,  claim- 
ing to  be  strictly  critical,  in  reality  throws  discredit  on  the 
documents  which  it  starts  to  criticise,^  and  which  are  the 
only  sources  available  for  obtaining  information  regarding 
the  history  which  is  to  be  described. 

But  there  is  no  necessity,  except  that  imposed  by  an 
unyielding  hypothesis,  for  this  last  resource.  If  laws 
were  not  given  by  Moses,  then  certainly  any  narratives 
that  describe  them  as  so  given  must  be  false.  But  if 
Moses  did  deliver  a  body  of  laws  to  his  people,  then 
even  if  the  laws,  as  they  stand,  indicate  divergency,  even 
if  they  underwent  modification,  even  if  the  codes  or  the 
books,  or  both,  are  of  much  later  composition,  in  their 
existing  forms,  than  the  time  of  Moses,  we  may  still  respect 

*  Compare  above,  chap,  vi,  p.  149  f. 


420  The  Law-Boohs, 

the  hona  fides  of  the  writers  of  the  books,  and  maintain 
them  as  substantially  true  history. 

I.  To  begin  with  the  book  of  Deuteronomy.  Some 
who  believe  that  this  book  is  of  late  date,  written  at 
the  time  of  Josiah  in  order  to  bring  about  a  reformation, 
and  yet  seek  to  maintain  the  hona  fides  of  the  writer,  are 
in  the  habit  of  saying  that  the  book  is  an  example  of 
pseudonymous  composition.  Briggs,  for  example,^  has 
argued  at  length  and  ingeniously  to  show  that  there  is 
nothing  unreasonable  in  the  supposition  of  pseudonymous 
literature  in  the  Bible,  and  by  reference  to  the  book  of 
Ecclesiastes  has  tried  to  save  this  book  of  Deuteronomy 
from  the  category  of  forgery  or  fiction.  But  in  point  of 
fact,  the  book  is  not  pseudonymous  in  the  same  way  that 
Ecclesiastes  is.  The  latter  book,  except  the  heading  at 
the  beginning  and  the  epilogue  (chap.  xii.  9  ff.)  at  the 
end,  is  all  written  in  one  person.  "  I,  the  preacher," 
did  so  and  so  throughout ;  and  his  personality,  "  son  of 
David,"  and  magnificence,  are  so  accentuated  as  to  lead 
to  the  conclusion  that  Solomon  is  meant.  But  the  writer 
by  saying,  "  was  king  over  Israel  in  Jerusalem,"  lets  us 
at  the  outset  into  his  secret,  which  is  simply  this,  that  he 
is  writing  in  the  name  of  Solomon,  to  represent  what 
might  have  been  Solomon's  reflections  upon  life.  There 
is  not  only  no  intent  to  deceive,  but  there  is  scarcely  the 
possibility  of  deception.    The  circumstances  of  a  historical 

*  Biblical  Study  (1887),  p.  223  ff.  He  appeals  also,  among  others,  to 
Robertson  Smith,  "  who  uses  the  term  legal  fiction  as  a  variety  of  literary 
fiction"  (see  Old  Testament  in  the  Jewish  Churcli,  p.  385).  What  is 
there  described,  however,  as  "  found  more  convenient  to  present  the  new 
law  in  a  form  which  enables  it  to  be  treated  as  an  integral  part  of  the  old 
legislation,"  though  probably  applicable  to  the  present  form  in  which  the 
collections  of  laws  appear,  does  not  seem  to  cover  the  case  of  the  hook  of 
Deuteronomy  with  which  we  are  concerned.  Compare  Clieyne,  Jeremiah, 
His  Life  and  Times,  p.  77. 


Deuteronomy  not  Pseudonymous.  421 

kind  that  are  introduced  are  so  few  and  so  general  that 
we  are  not  misled  or  misinformed  as  to  matters  of  fact ; 
all  the  rest  is  meditation,  moralising,  and  the  scheme  of  the 
book  is  &o  far  transparent.  But  it  is  quite  different  with 
the  book  of  Deuteronomy.  As  a  book,  it  does  not  profess 
to  be  written  by  Moses ;  it  is,  in  fact,  one  of  the  many 
anonymous  books  of  the  Old  Testament.  The  writer,  who- 
ever he  was,  and  at  whatever  time  he  lived,  tells  us  cer- 
tain things  that  Moses  did,  and  especially  produces  long 
addresses  which  Moses  is  said  to  have  uttered.  These  long 
speeches,  however,  are  all  set  in  a  historical  framework ; 
and  if  the  framework  is  not  historical,  the  book  is  more 
than  pseudonymous — it  is  pseudo-historical.  The  speeches 
by  themselves  might  be  taken  to  fall  into  the  category  of 
the  book  of  Ecclesiastes,  where  the  preacher  is  made  to 
give  the  thoughts  that  passed  through  his  mind.  But  if 
the  writer,  who  has  set  these  speeches  down  at  definite 
times  and  under  definite  circumstances,  is  not  correct  as 
to  the  time  and  circumstances,  or  if  the  events  he  weaves 
into  the  speeches  never  occurred,  he  is  manufacturing  these, 
not  studying  to  reproduce  them  by  historical  imagination. 
The  book  declares  that  at  a  certain  time,  and  under  certain 
circumstances,  Moses  gathered  the  people  and  addressed 
to  them  long  speeches  recalling  certain  facts.  If  Moses 
never  did  such  a  thing,  and  if  such  facts  never  occurred, 
the  book  must  be  simply  described  as  unhistorical  or  fic- 
titious. 

And  yet  I  do  not  think  it  is  to  be  so  regarded.  Who- 
ever was  the  author,  and  whatever  time  may  be  assigned 
for  its  composition,  this  is  what  the  book  presents  to  us. 
It  declares  that  Moses  at  the  close  of  the  wilderness  jour- 
ney, when  the  people  were  ready  to  cross  the  Jordan, 
made  formal  addresses  to  them,  in  which  he  recounted 


422  The  Law-Books. 

the  events  of  their  past  history,  recapitulated  the  laws 
which  he  had  laid  down  for  their  guidance,  and  warned 
them  against  the  temptations  to  which  they  would  be 
particularly  exposed  in  Canaan ;  threatening  them,  in 
case  of  disobedience,  with  God's  judgments,  and  promis- 
ing them,  in  case  of  obedience,  His  blessing.  N"ow,  if 
Moses  sustained  anything  at  all  like  the  office  which  is 
invariably  ascribed  to  him  in  the  books  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment; if  he  was  the  leader  of  the  people  to  the  borders 
of  Canaan,  the  founder  of  their  national  constitution,  the 
lawgiver  in  any  positive  and  definite  sense,— it  was  the 
most  natural  thing  in  the  world  that  he  should,  at  the 
close  of  his  life,  have  given  such  parting  counsels  and 
addresses  to  the  people  whose  history  was  so  closely 
bound  up  with  his  own  life's  work.  That  is  to  say,  the 
situation  which  the  book  of  Deuteronomy  presents  to  us 
is  a  situation  not  in  itself  improbable,  but  on  every  ground 
exceedingly  probable ;  and  the  statement  by  the  writer  of 
the  book  that  this  situation  presented  itself  is  such  that 
it  would  be  accepted  as  matter  of  fact  in  any  secular  his- 
torian. Further,  if  a  writer,  whether  early  or  late,  set 
himself  to  tell  all  this,  he  could  only  do  so  in  the  form 
in  which  the  book  of  Deuteronomy  comes  before  us. 

Let  us  not  be  misled  by  the  direct  form  in  which  these 
speeches  are  expressed.  Wellhausen,  in  one  place,^  speaks 
contemptuously  of  our  being  treated  to  long  addresses  in- 
stead of  historical  details.  It  is  somewhat  remarkable 
that  he,  and  many  like-minded,  have  not  taken  note 
of  the  peculiarity  of  the  Hebrew  language,  that  it  has 
not  developed  what  we  call  the  indirect  speech  —  a 
peculiarity  which  necessitates  the  regular  introduction 
of  speeches  or  addresses.      Take  such  a  passage  as  the 

*  History  of  Israel,  p.  340. 


Indirect  Speech.  423 

following:  When  the  children  of  Israel,  after  their  long 
wanderings  in  the  desert,  were  on  the  point  of  cross- 
ing the  Jordan  to  take  possession  of  the  land  to  which 
they  ha.d  looked  forward  as  their  inheritance,  Moses, 
who  had  been  their  constant  guide  and  legislator  for 
forty  years,  seeing  that  the  close  of  his  life  was  near, 
and  solicitous  for  the  welfare  of  the  people  whom  he  had 
hitherto  guided,  assembled  them  about  him,  and  in  various 
addresses  recapitulated  the  striking  events  of  their  past 
history,  dwelling  particularly  on  details  that  exhibited 
most  clearly  the  guiding  hand  of  God  and  the  fallibility 
and  frailty  of  Israel,  restated  the  fundamental  principles 
on  which  the  nation  was  constituted,  and  by  warning 
and  promise  directed  them  to  the  dangers  that  lay  in 
the  future  if  they  proved  unfaithful,  and  to  the  bless- 
ings in  store  for  them  if  tliey  adhered  to  allegiance  to 
their  national  God.  Let  any  professor  of  Hebrew  set 
liimself  to  state  in  idiomatic  Hebrew  what  all  this  implies 
in  detail,  and  he  will  be  bound  to  state  it  just  as  it  is  put 
down  in  this  book.  The  absence  of  the  indirect  speech 
in  Hebrew  can  be  made  quite  clear  to  the  English  reader 
by  a  reference  to  any  page  of  the  historical  books.  If  a 
writer  wishes  to  say  that  one  person  made  a  verbal  com- 
munication to  another,  he  must  say,  "So-and-so  spake 
to  So-and-so,  saying,"  and  must  give  the  ipsissima  verba. 
And  yet,  strictly  speaking,  the  writer  is  not  to  be  taken 
as  vouching  for  the  actual  words  spoken.  He  is  simply 
producing,  in  the  only  way  that  the  laws  of  his  language 
allow  him  to  produce,  the  substance  of  the  thing  said; 
and  from  beginning  to  end  of  the  Old  Testament  writings, 
the  language  remained  at  that  stage,  only  the  faintest 
attempts  to  pass  beyond  it  being  visible.  It  is  part  of 
that  direct,  graphic  style   of   Old   Testament   Scripture,. 


424  The  Law- Books. 

which  is  of  wide  extent,  and  is  based  on  the  intuitive, 
presentative  mode  of  thought  of  the  sacred  writers,  who 
must  describe  a  scene  by  painting  it  and  its  actors,  with 
their  words  and  gestures,  and  reproduce  a  communication 
in  the  actual  words  supposed  to  have  been  uttered.^ 

It  is  easy  to  see  now  how  a  writer,  soon  after  or  long 
after  Moses,  recalling  the  events  which  we  may  suppose 
tradition  preserved  in  the  nation's  mind,  and  using  we 
know  not  what  documents,  produced  a  book  like  Deuteron- 
omy. The  situation  was  not  one  of  active  events,  but  of 
reflective  pause  and  consideration,  preparatory  to  the  ardu- 
ous work  of  the  contest,  and  hence  the  literary  form  of  the 
book  is  different  from  that  of  the  other  books  of  the  Pen- 
tateuch. Not  by  any  fiction,  not  by  inventing  a  story  for 
a  purpose,  but  in  perfect  good  faith,  he  represents  the  aged 
lawgiver,  surrounded  by  the  people  whose  welfare  lay  so 
much  at  his  heart,  giving  them  such  counsel,  warning,  and 
encouragement  as  were  suited  to  their  circumstances.  It 
was  but  natural  that  a  writer,  setting  himself  to  such  a 
task,  should  mingle  much  of  his  own  in  the  composition. 
No  writer  can  divest  himself  of  his  own  personality,  or 
write  entirely  without  reference  to  the  time  in  which  he 
lives.  And  a  wTiter  succeeding  Moses,  at  a  greater  or  less 
interval,  could  not  but  see  the  development  of  events 
which  were  only  in  germ  in  Moses'  time,  and  could  not 
help  representing  them  more  or  less  in  their  developed 
form.  In  this  sense,  and  to  this  extent,  it  is  true  that  any 
late  writer  writes  under  the  influence  of  later  ideas  ;  and 
the  objection  taken  by  critical  writers  to  such  a  course  is 
an  objection  that  would  apply  to  all  writing  of  history. 

1  I  may  be  allowed  in  this  connection  to  refer  to  a  paper  on  the 
"Graphic  Element  in  the  Old  Testament"  in  the  Expositor,  second 
scries,  vol.  vi.  p.  241  £F. 


The  Good  Faith  of  the  Writer.  425 

But  between  this — which  is  done  in  absolute  good  faith 
— and  the  wholesale  manufacturing  of  incidents  and  sit- 
uations, there  is  all  the  difference  between  history  and 
fiction.  We  cannot  think  of  such  a  writer  imagining 
his  events  so  as  to  represent  Moses  recapitulating  a 
series  of  occurrences  that  did  not  take  place,  or  which 
the  writer  did  not  firmly  believe  did  take  place,  or 
ascribing  to  him  laws  which  he  did  not  consider  to 
have  been  in  their  form  or  substance  propounded  to  the 
people  whom  Moses  addressed. 

Laws  are  indeed,  as  has  been  already  said,  subject  to 
change  with  changing  circumstances,  and  observances  are 
liable  to  assume  new  phases  to  meet  new  emergencies. 
A  law,  given  at  first  with  a  general  reference,  may  come 
face  to  face  with  actual  states  of  society  which  force  it 
to  take  a  more  definite  shape  to  meet  the  cases  that 
have  arisen.  This  is  development  of  law,  but  it  is  not 
change  of  the  substance  of  the  law.  Now  if,  as  is  surely 
most  reasonable  to  assume,  Moses  did  warn  his  people 
against  the  idolatries  of  the  nations  of  Canaan,  and  enjoin 
them  to  maintain  their  own  religious  faith  and  observ- 
ances, the  force  of  such  warnings  and  admonitions  would 
be  accentuated  when  the  actual  dangers  emerged ;  the  law 
would  be  seen  in  its  farther  reference,  and  assume  a  more 
specific  and  precise  form  in  the  minds  of  those  who 
looked  at  it.  If,  then,  a  later  writer,  believing  in  all  good 
faith  that  Moses  gave  such  admonitions,  had  before  his 
eyes  the  actual  dangers  which  the  lawgiver  had  in  a 
general  way  foreseen,  he  could  not  help,  in  restating  the 
laws,  giving  them  a  sharper  and  more  incisive  point ;  but 
he  was  not  thereby  either  changing  or  inventing  a  law 
This  would  be  to  develop  law  in  the  spirit  of  the  Mosaic 
legislation,  on  the  understanding,  however,  that  there  was 


426  The  Law-Boohs, 

a  positive  Mosaic  legislation  to  be  developed.  And  all 
this  again,  it  seems  to  me,  is  compatible  with  the  good 
faith  of  the  writer  and  with  the  substantial  historical 
accuracy  of  his  narrative.  It  is,  however,  quite  a  different 
thing  from  the  supposition  that  the  writer,  after  he  had 
seen  certain  dangers  and  abuses  emerge,  set  himself  to 
devise  a  law  which  was  quite  new,  in  order  to  meet  these, 
and  deliberately  contrived  a  whole  set  of  historical  occur- 
rences, in  which  it  was  feigned  that  the  laws  were  given 
forth  in  Mosaic  times. 

It  will  be  remembered  that  those  who  make  the  Code 
of  Deuteronomy  late,  usually  say  that  the  writer  drew 
up  laws  in  the  spirit  of  the  Mosaic  legislation ;  and  even 
Wellhausen  says  that  the  book  of  "  Deuteronomy  presup- 
poses earlier  attempts  of  this  kind,  and  borrows  its  mate- 
rials largely  from  them."^  The  Biblical  account  of  the 
matter  is,  that  Moses  actually  wrote  down  the  laws  con- 
tained in  the  book.  There  was,  in  other  words,  a  Deuter- 
onomic  Code  prior  to  the  book  of  Deuteronomy ;  this  is 
what  the  critics  themselves  say,  and  what  the  book  itself 
says.  The  question  is,  Did  the  Code,  in  a  written  form 
and  to  an  appreciable  extent,  come  from  Moses  himself  ? 
On  the  one  side  we  have  these  vague  admissions  as  to  the 
*'  spirit  of  the  Mosaic  legislation  "  (and  how  was  a  late 
writer  to  know  what  that  spirit  was  unless  by  positive 
enactment  ?),  and  the  equally  vague  admission  of  "  former 
attempts,"  without  positive  specification  of  the  time  and 
extent  of  the  attempts  that  were  made.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  have  the  positive  statement  that  Moses,  at  his 
death,  left  a  body  of  laws  such  as  are  included  in  the 
book  of  Deuteronomy.  That  we  have  the  very  words  of 
the  laws  as  he  penned  them,  the  custom  of  literary  com- 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  402.     See  above,  p.  399  f. 


Books  containing  the  Levitical  Code,  427 

position,  and  the  ordinary  fates  of  legislative  codes,  show 
us  we  are  not  forced  to  suppose.  What  became  of  the 
actual  collection  of  laws,  beyond  the  fact  that  it  was  de- 
livered to  the  Levites,  and  deposited  in  the  side  of  the  ark,^ 
we  are  not  told.  And  moreover,  at  what  time  and  by 
whose  hands  the  whole  of  the  book  of  Deuteronomy,  as 
we  now  have  it,  was  composed,  is  a  matter  which  literary 
criticism  alone  cannot  decide.  It  is  only  by  inferences, 
not  very  clear  in  themselves,  that  the  conclusion  is  reached 
that  the  book  belongs  to  the  age  of  Josiah ;  but  even  if, 
as  a  book,  it  belongs  to  that  age,  or  later,  I  think  the 
considerations  advanced  will  show  how  it  may  be  still 
historical  and  trustworthy,  exhibiting  at  once  the  work- 
ing of  a  later  development  of  old  principles,  and  pre- 
serving also — not  inventing  for  the  occasion — elements 
which  are  ancient  and  Mosaic.^ 

II.  Of  the  other  law-books,  we  have  to  deal  particu- 
larly with  those  that  embody  the  Levitical  Code.  Here 
the  narrative  and  the  legal  elements  are  very  closely 
blended;  but  I  think  it  is  possible,  even  on  the  suppo- 
sition that  the  Code  underwent  modification  in  course  of 
time,  to  accept  the  books  as  trustworthy  historical  records. 
Let  us,  however,  first  of  all,  see  how  the  critical  writers 
account  for  the  introduction  of  the  Code  and  its  related 
narratives. 

It  is  said  that  Ezekiel 

*'  in  the  last  part  of  his  work  made  the  first  attempt  to  record  the 
ritual  which  had  been  customary  in  the  Temple  of  Jerusalem.  Other 
priests  attached  themselves  to  him  (Levit.  xvii.-xxvi.),  and  thus  there 
grew  up  in  the  exile  from  among  the  members  of  this  profession  a 
kind  of  school  of  people  who  reduced  to  writing  and  to  a  system 
what  they  had  formerly  practised  in  the  way  of  their  calhng.     After 


1  Deut.  xxxi.  26-  2  gee  Note  XXVIII. 


428  The  Law-Boohs. 

the  Temple  was  restored  tliis  theoretical  zeal  still  continued  to  worlr, 
and  the  ritual  when  renewed  was  still  further  developed  by  the 
action  and  reaction  on  each  other  of  theory  and  practice."  ^  "  So 
long  as  the  sacrificial  worship  remained  in  actual  use,  it  was  zealously 
carried  on,  but  people  did  not  concern  themselves  with  it  theoreti- 
cally, and  had  not  the  least  occasion  for  reducing  it  to  a  Code.  But 
once  the  Temple  was  in  ruins,  the  cultus  at  an  end,  Mq 'personnel  out 
of  employment,  it  is  easy  to  understand  how  the  sacred  praxis  should 
have  become  a  matter  of  theory  and  writing,  so  that  it  might  not 
altogether  perish,  and  how  an  exiled  priest  should  have  begun  to 
paint  the  picture  of  it  as  he  carried  it  in  his  memory,  and  to  publish 
it  as  a  programme  for  the  future  restoration  of  the  theocracy.  Nor 
is  there  any  difficulty  if  arrangements,  which  as  long  as  they  were 
actually  in  force  were  simply  regarded  as  natural,  were  seen  after 
their  abolition  in  a  transfiguring  light,  and  from  the  study  devoted 
to  them  gained  artificially  a  still  higher  value."  ^ 

All  this  may  not  be  so  "  easy  to  understand  "  to  every- 
body as  it  seems  to  be  to  Wellhausen.  Indeed  the  things 
that  he  finds  "  no  difficulty  "  in  accepting  are  very  often 
the  very  things  for  which  proof  is  most  desiderated.  As 
to  codification  being  tlie  deposit  during  the  exile  of  an  old, 
fully  developed  praxis,  we  have  already  had  something  to 
say  (p.  400  f.) ;  and  Bredenkamp  exclaims  with  justifiable 
astonishment,  "Clouds  which  are  formed  in  the  time  of 
grandsires  are  not  in  the  habit  of  raining  upon  grandsons. 
Could  people  not  write  in  pre-exilic  times  ?  Must  they 
not  be  allowed  to  write  ?  Why  tear  with  violence  the 
pen  from  the  hand  of  the  ancient  Israelitish  priests  ? "  ^ 
We  are  told  indeed  by  Wellhausen,  on  his  own  authority, 
that  the  praxis  of  the  priests  at  the  altar  never  formed 
part  of  the  written  law  in  pre-exilic  times.*  But  Dill- 
mann,  who  has  subjected  these  books  to  a  most  thorough 
examination,  not  'only  sees  nothing  against  the  idea,  but 

1  Well.,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  404  ;  comp.  496.         ^  Ibid.,  p.  59  f. 

*  Gesetz  und  Propheten,  p.  118.  *  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  59. 


Effects  of  the  Exile.  429 

finds  positive  proof  for  it,  that  the  priests  at  the  Temple 
of  Jerusalem  were  in  the  habit  of  writing  down  the  laws 
and  regulations  for  their  ceremonial  functions.^  Besides, 
Wellhausen  has  to  assume  for  the  nonce  that  the  praxis 
which  was  "zealously  carried  on"  anterior  to  the  exile 
was  just  what  underwent  codification  after  it;  although 
his  general  contention  is  that  in  the  pre-exilic  period  "  no 
trace  can  be  found  of  acquaintance  with  the  Priestly  Code, 
but  on  the  other  hand,  very  clear  indications  of  ignorance 
of  its  contents."  ^  If,  however,  such  "  ignorance  of  its 
contents  "  prevailed,  how  was  an  exiled  priest  or  a  number 
of  priests  to  carry  the  whole  thing  in  memory  and  reduce 
it  to  writing  ?  Moreover,  what  he  ascribes  to  the  time 
of  the  exile,  seems  ill  to  agree  with  the  statement  of  the 
matter  which  he  gives  in  another  place.  The  Babylonian 
exile,  he  says, 

"violently  tore  the  nation  away  from  its  native  soil  and  kept  it 
apart  for  half  a  century, — a  breach  of  historical  continuity  than 
which  it  is  almost  impossible  to  conceive  a  greater.  The  new 
generation  had  no  natural  but  only  an  artificial  relation  to  the  times 
of  old  ;  the  firmly  rooted  growths  of  the  old  soil,  regarded  as  tfiorns 
by  the  pious,  were  extirpated,  and  the  freshly  ploughed  fallows 
ready  for  a  new  sowing."  ^ 

He  then  goes  on  to  say  that  it  is 

"  far  from  being  the  case  that  the  whole  people  at  that  time 
underwent  a  general  conversion  in  the  sense  of  the  prophets.  .  .  . 
Only  the  pious  ones,  who  with  trembling  followed  Jehovah's  word, 
were  left  as  a  remnant ;  they  alone  had  the  strength  to  maintain 
the  Jewish  individuality  amid  the  medley  of  nationalities  into  which 
they  had  been  thrown.  From  the  exile  there  returned,  not  the 
nation,  but  a  religious  sect — those,  namely,  who  had  given  them- 


^  Die  Biicher  Exodus  u.  Leviticus,  2*^°  Auflage,  p.  386.     He  calls  Well- 
hausen's  position  "an  arbitrary  assertion." 

2  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  59.     Comp.  above,  p.  394.  ^  j^i^j^  p^  28. 


430  The  Law-Boohs. 

selves  up  body  and  soul  to  the  reformation  ideas.  It  is  no  wonder 
that  to  these  people,  who  besides,  on  their  return,  all  settled  in  the 
immediate  neighbourhood  of  Jerusalem,  the  thought  never  once 
occurred  of  restoring  the  local  cults.  It  cost  them  no  struggle  to 
allow  the  destro^'ed  Banioth  to  continue  lying  in  ruins  ;  the  prin- 
ciple had  become  part  of  their  very  being,  that  the  one  God  had 
also  but  one  place  of  worship,  and  thenceforward  for  all  time  coming 
this  was  regarded  as  a  thing  of  course." 

This  aspect  of  the  exile  as  a  violent  wrench  from  old 
associations  is  hardly  consistent  with  the  view  that  a 
priestly  party  from  the  very  beginning  of  the  captivity 
took  up  the  minute  study  and  arrangement  of  the  sacri- 
ficial system  which  had  just  been  broken  up.  Nor,  al- 
though it  is  "  no  wonder  "  to  Wellhausen,  is  it  very  clear 
that  a  people  should  so  easily  forget  all  that  was  bad  in 
the  past  worship  (and  how  much  of  it  was  bad !)  and  so 
readily  begin  life  anew  on  an  entirely  new  principle. 
Indeed  this  whole  account  of  the  influence  of  the  exile 
on  the  codification  of  law  does  not  by  any  means  turn  out 
to  be  so  easy  as  Wellhausen  would  make  us  believe. 

(X,)  In  tlie  first  place,  we  are  told  that  "  the  transition 
from  the  pre-exilic  to  the  post-exilic  period  is  effected,  not 
by  Deuteronomy,  but  by  Ezekiel  the  priest  in  prophet's 
mantle,  who  was  one  of  the  first  to  be  carried  into  exile."  ^ 
Ezekiel's  so-called  programme  is  so  confidently  appealed 
to  as  the  precursor  of  the  Levitical  Code,  that  to  assert 
anything  to  the  contrary  at  the  present  day  is  to  expose 
one's  self  to  ridicule  as  incompetent  to  understand  criti- 
cal processes.  Nay,  so  important  are  the  chapters  in 
the  book  of  Ezekiel  which  contain  this  programme,  that 
Wellhausen  says  they  have  been  called,  not  incorrectly, 
"  the  key  of  the  Old  Testament."  ^  The  chapters  in 
question  are  xl.  to  xlviii.     They  form  a  connected  piece, 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  59.  '  Ibid.,  p.  421. 


EzekieVs  Vision.  431 

and  tell  us  how  the  prophet  was,  "in  the  visions  of 
God,"  brought  into  the  land  of  Israel,  and  what  he  saw 
and  was  told  there.  He  dwells  at  great  length  on  the 
measurements  and  details  of  arrangement  of  the  Temple, 
and  communicates  directions  for  its  dedication  and  for  its 
service.  He  also  describes  the  waters  issuing  from  under 
the  house  and  going  to  fertilise  the  desert ;  and  he  lays 
out  minutely  the  measurements  of  the  sacred  territory 
and  the  situation  of  the  tribes  in  the  land.  Now 
surely,  by  all  honest  criticism,  whatever  mode  of  inter- 
pretation is  applied  to  one  part  of  this  vision  should  be 
made  to  apply  to  the  whole.  If  one  part  is  a  cool,  de- 
liberate programme,  so  should  the  others.  If  the  other 
parts  are  clearly  not  to  be  taken  in  this  sense,  neither 
should  the  ceremonial  part.  Ezekiel  is  just  as  precise 
and  matter-of-fact  in  the  divisions  which  he  makes  of  the 
Holy  Land  as  in  the  ordinances  he  puts  forth  for  the  wor- 
ship of  the  sanctuary.  Yet  the  critical  school  proceeds  in 
the  most  elaborate  fashion  to  examine  this  code  or  pro- 
gramme, and  tells  us  that  it  is  the  first  attempt  to  arrange 
what  afterwards  became  the  Levitical  Code.  Why  do  they 
not  say  also  that  his  geographical  sketch  is  to  be  under- 
stood, say,  as  the  starting-point  for  the  tribal  divisions  of 
the  book  of  Joshua,  or  that  his  sketch  of  the  Temple  is 
the  groundwork  of  Solomon's  ?  I  must  confess  simply  that 
I  cannot  understand  the  principle  of  a  criticism  that  thus 
tears  one  piece  out  of  connection  and  seeks  to  make  it  a 
serious  historical  programme,  while  not  a  word  can  be  said 
in  favour  of  treating  the  other  parts  in  the  same  way.  If 
two-thirds  of  the  vision  are  clearly  ideal,  so  must  the  other 
third,  in  whatever  way  we  are  to  understand  the  ideal 
meaning  which  the  prophet  meant  to  convey.  If  it  be 
urged    that   Ezekiel    did    not    need   to    give    details    for 


432  TJie  Law- Boohs. 

ritual  if  a  ritual  law  existed,  and  that  he  makes  no 
reference  to  any  law  on  the  subject,  it  can  be  rejoined 
that  he  speaks  in  the  same  way  of  Temple  and  land. 
We  cannot  gather  from  his  description  that  the  Temple 
of  Solomon  was  ever  built  or  the  land  ever  divided 
among  the  tribes  before  his  day.  "  This,"  he  says,  "  shall 
be  the  border,  whereby  ye  shall  divide  the  land  for  in- 
heritance according  to  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel:  .  .  . 
concerning  the  which  I  lifted  up  mine  hand  to  give  it 
unto  your  fathers ;"  ^  and  he  gives  all  the  measurements 
of  some  house  seen  in  vision  without  referring  to  a  house 
which  he  knew  quite  well  as  having  stood  for  centuries. 
We  need  not  therefore  wonder  at  his  bringing  in  a  de- 
tailed ritual,  as  if  this  were  the  first  time  such  a  thing  had 
been  heard  or  thought  of.  He  is  not  for  the  first  time  in 
history  trying  to  fix  a  ritual  for  a  people  who  had  hitherto 
nothing  but  custom  to  guide  them.  His  sketch  is  too 
brief  altogether  for  such  an  attempt.  No  priesthood 
could  have  carried  on  the  service  of  the  sanctuary  and 
regulated  the  worship  of  the  nation  with  such  a  vague 
and  fragmentary  manual.  As  to  its  being  as  a  literary 
work  the  foundation  of  the  later  Levitical  Code,  it  is 
not  by  any  means  certain  that  in  language  or  matter 
the  Levitical  Code  is  dependent  upon  it.  A  careful 
examination  has  led  competent  judges  to  decide  that  the 
reverse  is  the  case,^  though  I  do  not  think  it  necessary  to 
go  into  this. 

But  it  may  be  urged,  if  there  was  a  detailed  authori- 
tative law  in  existence,  why  did  Ezekiel,  even  in  vision, 
deviate  from  it  ?     Well,  on  the  critical  hypothesis  the 

1  Ezek.  xlvii.  13,  14. 

2  See,  e.g.,  Bredenkamp,  Gesetz  und  Propheten,  p.   116  ff. ;  Dillmann, 
Die  Biicher  Exodus  u.  Leviticus,  p.  524  ff.     See  also  Note  XXIX. 


Study  of  Cultus  in  the  Exile,  433 

Deuteronomic  law  at  least  existed  as  authoritative,  and 
yet  Ezekiel  deviates  from  it.  If  it  is  still  asked,  How 
could  he,  prophet  though  he  was,  quietly  set  aside  the 
recognised  law  ?  the  question  again  arises.  After  he,  a 
prophet  speaking  in  God's  name  by  direct  revelation, 
sketched  this  law,  how  did  priests  in  tlie  exile  pass  by 
Ezekiel's  draft,  and  frame  a  divergent  code  ?  In  fact, 
there  are  insuperable  difficulties  on  every  side  when 
this  ritual  of  Ezekiel  is  taken  as  a  cool,  matter-of-fact 
programme  of  legislation,  put  forth  as  a  first  attempt  at 
codification ;  and  no  argument  can  be  based  upon  it  for 
the  modern  theory. 

(2.)  And  then,  secondly,  it  is  quite  conceivable  that  the 
people  in  the  exile  should  have  turned  their  attention  to 
matters  of  law.  They  would  be  compelled,  in  order  to 
keep  themselves  separate  from  the  surrounding  heathen, 
to  attend  to  those  matters  of  personal,  ceremonial,  and 
social  order  which  were  their  national  distinctions,  and, 
so  far,  their  very  existence  as  a  separate  people  in  the 
exile  is  a  proof  of  pre-existing  law.  But  it  is  not  so 
clear,  by  any  means,  that  they  should  for  the  first  time 
make  a  study  of  purely  Levitical  and  sacrificial  laws  at 
a  time  when  they  had  no  cultus.  ISTor,  in  view  of  the 
zeal  for  the  law  shown  at  a  later  time  by  the  Jews  in 
Babylon,  is  it  so  clear  that  only  a  few  underwent  a 
"conversion  in  the  sense  of  the  prophets."  AVellhausen 
has  to  suppose  a  school  of  people  who  gave  themselves 
ardently  to  this  study  of  ritual  law.  It  was  a  large 
school,  if  the  number  of  returning  exiles  is  taken  into 
account.  All  these  must  have  been  in  Ezra's  secret  on 
this  view, — all  ardently  devoted  to  the  reformation  ideas. 
Now,  in  point  of  fact,  Ezra's  own  account  is  that  he  had 
a  deficiency  of  Levites  among  his  volunteers,  and  had  to 

2  E 


434  The  Law-Boohs. 

urge  them  to  join  him  and  to  act  as  "  ministers  for  the 
house  of  oitr  God  "  (Ezra  viii.  15  ff.)  Moreover,  Haggai 
sliows  us  that  the  people  were  very  far  indeed  from 
being  devoted  to  the  reformation  ideas ;  the  sacrificial 
system  was  slackly  observed ;  and  even  in  Ezra's  and 
Nehemiah's  time  the  picture  of  the  people  is  anything 
but  that  of  a  community  that  "  had  given  themselves  up 
body  and  soul  to  the  reformation  ideas  "  of  either  morals 
or  worship.^ 

(3.)  But,  further,  difficult  as  it  is  to  believe  that  the  so- 
called  school  for  the  first  time  put  down  in  writing  what 
they  treasured  in  their  memories,  this  is  not  the  whole  of 
the  hypothesis.  Again,  and  in  a  much  more  objectionable 
form,  comes  in  the  supposition  of  fiction,  whereby  a  false 
historical  setting  was  invented  for  the  laws  of  the  Le- 
vitical  Code,  by  carrying  them  back  to  Moses  and  the 
desert,  simply  in  order  to  give  the  law  higher  sanction. 
Not  only,  for  example,  was  there  no  tabernacle,  such  as  is 
described  in  the  Pentateuch,  prepared  in  the  wilderness, 
but  even  at  the  time  when  the  story  of  its  construction 
was  fabricated,  there  was  no  such  tabernacle  to  have 
given  rise  to  the  fable,  nor  had  any  such  tabernacle 
ever  existed  to  give  a  start  to  the  story.^  It  was  simply 
the  legend-spinning  invention  of  men  of  late  time  that 
cut  down  the  dimensions  of  the  Temple  to  half  their  size, 
and  feigned  that  a  tabernacle  of  that  size  existed  in  a 
portable  form  in  the  wilderness;  and  all  this  simply  to 
make  it  appear  that  the  Temple  worship  was  of  older 
institution  than  the  time  of  the  building  of  the  Temple. 
So  also  a  fictitious  origin  is  given  for  what  the  Code  rep- 

1  Ezra  ix.  1  ff. ;  Neh.  v.  1  ff.,  xiii.  4  ff.,  15  ff.,  23  ff.  ;  Mai.  i.  6  ff.,  ii. 
8ff. 

2  Wellhausen,  p.  37  ff. 


Manufacture  of  History.  435 

resents  as  other  early  institutions.  In  every  case  in 
which  a  law  is  said  to  have  been  given  in  Mosaic  times, 
the  circumstances,  if  stated,  must  be  similarly  explained 
as  invented  or  suggested  in  a  late  time.  In  this  way, 
all  sorts  of  divergences  of  the  narrative  of  the  Priestly 
Code  from  that  of  the  Jehovist  are  accentuated,  and  it 
is  made  to  appear — at  the  expense,  it  must  be  admitted,  of 
wonderful  ingenuity — that  the  former  are  of  exilic  time 
— i.e.y  of  the  date  of  or  subsequent  to  the  introduction  of 
the  laws.^ 

The  question  is  whether  the  palm  of  ingenuity  is  to  be 
assigned  to  the  writers  of  these  books  or  to  the  modern 
critics ;  whether  a  school  composed  of  men  like  Ezekiel  and 
Ezra  were  likely  to  have  with  boundless  inventiveness 
concocted  all  this  history,  or  our  modern  critics  are  ran- 
sacking the  treasures  of  their  wits  to  find  an  artificial 
explanation  of  a  thing  that  is  much  more  simple  than 
they  make  it  ?  For  what  could  have  been  the  object  in  in- 
venting history  wholesale  in  this  way  ?  To  give  sanction 
to  the  laws,  it  is  said :  but  on  whom  was  the  sanction  to 
bear  ?  If  on  the  men  of  the  priestly  school  themselves, 
they  were  already,  on  the  hypothesis,  devoted  to  the  refor- 
mation ideas  ;  if  on  the  people  at  large,  the  mere  manufac- 
ture of  a  history  that  was  new  to  them  was  not  likely  to 
rouse  them  from  their  lethargy  and  fire  tliem  with  new 
zeal ;  and,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  it  did  not.  It  is  to  be  re- 
membered— and  the  remark  applies  also  to  the  production 
of  Deuteronomy — that  this  was  not  a  case  of  a  person  in 
secret  devising  an  unheard-of  scheme  of  history,  and  lay- 
ing it  away  to  be  read  by  posterity.  Nor  was  it,  as  I 
understand  the  theory,  a  case  of  gathering  up  for  a  present 
purpose  the  old  and  cherished  traditions  of  a  people.     The 

^  See  Note  XXX. 


436  The  Law-Books. 

thing  was  done,  so  to  speak,  in  open  day  for  a  special 
purpose  at  the  time,  a  consideraljle  number  of  persons 
being  engaged  in  it,  and  among  a  people  who  already  had 
a  definite  tradition  as  to  their  history.  Yet,  though  the 
people,  at  least  in  Jeremiah's  days,  were  critical  enough 
in  matters  of  the  national  history  (Jer.  xxvi.  16  ff.),  we 
never  hear,  either  then  or  at  the  time  of  the  restoration, 
of  any  suspicion  being  cast  upon  the  account  of  the  history 
which  these  law-books  contain. 

(4.)  But  the  form  in  which  the  Levitical  Code  appears 
is  not  favourable  to  the  modern  theory  of  its  origin.  The 
laws  are  in  many  cases,  it  will  be  observed,  provided  with 
headings,  which  vary  in  a  curious  manner,  as,  e.g.,  "  The 
Lord  spake  unto  Moses,"  "The  Lord  spake  unto  Moses 
and  Aaron,"  and  even  "  the  Lord  spake  unto  Aaron  " ;  and 
the  persons  to  whom  the  laws  are  directed  are  various,  as 
"  the  children  of  Israel,"  "  Aaron  and  his  sons,"  "  all  the 
congregation  of  the  children  of  Israel,"  and  "  Aaron  and 
his  sons  and  all  the  children  of  Israel."  Such  features 
as  these,  as  well  as  the  manner  in  which  the  laws  are 
arranged,  the  same  subject  coming  up  more  than  once, 
and  the  same  law  being  repeated  in  different  places,  give 
one  the  impression  that  the  laws  were  collected  together 
from  different  sources.  It  looks  as  if  there  had  been 
smaller  collections,  regulating  individual  observances,  and 
perhaps  intrusted  to  different  persons  for  preservation  and 
execution.  At  all  events,  the  collection  does  not  present 
the  appearance  of  a  systematic  Code.  This  feature,  I 
should  think,  is  more  opposed  to  the  idea  of  composi- 
tion by  Ezra  and  a  school,  who  would  surely,  when  the 
whole  system  was  for  the  first  time  to  be  set  down  in 
writing,  have  proceeded  in  a  more  systematic  manner, 
than  to  the  idea  of  Mosaic  origin  and  gradual  modification 


Latitude  allowed  hy  Biblical  Writers.  437 

in  course  of  time.  I  have  already  referred  to  the  peculi- 
arity of  the  Hebrew  speech,  whereby  the  direct  words 
must  be  put  into  the  moutli  of  the  speaker,  when  we 
need  only  assume  the  substance  of  the  thing  delivered. 
The  headings  of  those  laws,  on  this  common-sense  mode 
of  viewing  the  matter,  mean  no  more  than  that  the  laws 
originally  came  from  Mosaic  times ;  the  history  is  satis- 
fied, and  the  hona  fides  of  the  writers  is  maintained.  So 
that  even  if  the  final  codification  took  place  as  late  as 
Ezra,  the  Code,  and  still  more  the  institutions,  might  with 
propriety  and  substantial  accuracy  be  described  as  Mosaic. 
The  Biblical  writers  do  not  fix  for  us  the  time  or  times 
at  which  the  laws  as  they  lie  before  us  were  written 
down ;  and  their  statements,  fairly  interpreted,  allow  us 
to  suppose  that  the  books  passed  through  many  literary 
processes  before  they  reached  their  final  form.  The  mul- 
tiplicity of  the  sources  out  of  which  the  law-books  are 
composed  is  a  proof  of  long-continued  literary  history. 
The  peculiar  arrangement  of  the  legal  portions,  nay,  their 
very  divergence  from  one  another,  prove  that  law  was 
for  long  a  living  thing,  and  that  the  Codes  are  not  re- 
suscitated from  the  memories  of  priests  or  excogitated  by 
scribes.  If,  as  seems  quite  reasonable,  the  laws  for  various 
ceremonies  were,  in  the  hands  of  those  who  had  charge  of 
them,  copied  and  handed  on  from  generation  to  genera- 
tion of  priests,  it  is  quite  probable  that  in  the  course  of 
time  there  might  have  liappened  alterations  of  the  rubric 
with  altered  circumstances,  and  that  the  final  transcript 
or  redaction  would  thus  have  a  more  modern  cast  than 
the  original.  All  this,  however,  does  not  disprove  the 
antiquity  of  the  legislation  nor  the  early  writing  of  the 
laws,  and  it  is  surely,  though  not  so  ingenious,  yet  a  much 
more  ingenuous  explanation  than  to  say  that  the  laws 


0?  TI^ 


WTTrW 


438  The  Law-Boohs. 

were  by  a  fiction  ascribed  to  ancient  time  in  order  to  give 
them  an  authority  to  which  they  were  not  entitled.  By 
taking  the  statements  of  the  Biblical  writers  as  they 
stand,  and  not  burdening  them  with  conclusions  for  which 
they  are  not  responsible,  we  get  a  more  consistent  and 
natural  view  of  the  whole  history  of  the  law — a  view  that 
certainly  in  itself  is  more  credible  to  one  who  is  not  pre- 
judiced against  the  Biblical  writers,  and  set  to  watch  for 
their  halting.  For  the  rest,  the  order  of  the  Codes  as 
Codes  written,  the  relation  of  laws  to  one  another,  and 
their  modifications  in  detail  with  advancing  time — these 
are  things  that  criticism  may  exercise  its  ingenuity  upon, 
and  seek  to  exhibit  in  their  true  lights  and  proportions. 
But  they  are  more  of  archaeological  than  of  practical  in- 
terest in  reference  to  the  great  point  which  we  wish  to 
ascertain,  the  origin  and  development  of  the  religion ;  and 
it  is  mainly  because  they  have  been  too  much  bound  up 
with  that  question  that  they  have  acquired  so  much  im- 
portance. There  can  be  no  harm  in  critical  investigation 
of  this  kind,  so  long  as  the  main  course  of  the  history, 
which  rests  on  its  own  independent  proofs,  is  taken  as  the 
guiding  principle  of  the  criticism.  It  is,  to  say  the  least, 
very  doubtful  whether  at  this  distance  of  two  or  three 
thousand  years  we  are  in  a  position  to  determine,  with 
any  measure  of  success,  the  dates  of  the  respective  sources 
of  which  the  books  of  the  Pentateuch  are  made  up.  The 
extraordinary  turns  that  modern  criticism  has  taken  on 
the  subject  testify  to  the  difficulty  of  the  problem,  if  they 
do  not  shake  our  confidence  in  its  ability  to  solve  it. 
The  curious  blending  of  elements  in  the  composite  struc- 
ture of  these  books,  while  it  impresses  on  us  the  magnitude 
of  the  task  of  criticism,  suggests  a  gradual  and  repeated 
process  of  editing,  transcribing,  and  modification  which  is 


Natural  Froductio7i  of  Boohs.  439 

perfectly  conceivable  among  a  people  well  acquainted  with 
literary  processes.  The  essential  point  to  be  remembered 
— the  point  to  which  all  our  investigations  have  tended 
— is,  that  the  law  and  the  writing  of  it  are  much  older 
than  modern  critics  allow;  and  the  phenomenon  wliich 
the  books  as  books  present  to  us  is  much  more  reason- 
ably accounted  for  on  the  Biblical  principle  than  on  the 
modern  theory:  they  are  a  product,  in  a  natural  way, 
of  history,  both  religious  and  literary — not  compositions, 
framed  according  to  a  literary  method  altogether  unpar- 
alleled in  order  to  manufacture  a  history  which  never 
was. 


440 


CHAPTEE     XYII. 

LAW  AND   PROPHECY. 

The  order  of  law  and  prophets  reversed  by  modern  theory,  and  this  not 
merely  as  an  order  of  written  documents  but  of  history — (1)  Position 
examined  that  all  the  prophets  denied  the  divine  authority  of  sacrifice 
and  ritual  laws — Passages  from  Isaiah,  Micah,  Hosea,  Jeremiah  con- 
sidered— (2)  The  position  that  the  Deuteronomic  Code  was  introduced 
through  prophetic  influence,  and  toith  it  the  impulse  given  to  legalism 
— Inconsistent  character  in  which  the  prophets  are  inade  to  appear  in 
Tnodern  theory — The  whole  position  of  the  prophets  as  religious  guides 
is  to  be  taken  into  account  —  The  Covenant,  and  what  it  implied — 
The  historical  situation  in  Josiah''s  time  does  not  agree  with  modern 
theory — Nor  does  the  situation  at  and  after  the  exile — Fundamental 
harmony  of  law  and  prophecy — The  history  did  not  turn  on  a  struggle 
of  parties — Law  and  Gospel, 

AccOEDiXG  to  the  modern  theory  the  Biblical  order  of 
law  and  prophets  is  reversed  into  the  order  of  prophets 
and  law.  Did  this  merely  amount  to  the  assertion  that 
some  of  the  prophetical  writings  existed  before  the  Penta- 
teuch had  assumed  its  present  form,  it  might  be  a  defen- 
sible position  on  grounds  of  literary  criticism.^  It  is,  how- 
ever, maintained  in  tlie  sense  that  prophetic  activity  comes 
historically  before  the  acceptance  of  authoritative  law, 
and  that,  in  fact,  by  a  course  of  development,  the  prophets 

1  Cf.  Wellhausen,  p.  409. 


Attitude  of  Prophets  to  Law,  441 

brought  about  the  introduction  of  the  law.  The  position 
which,  on  this  theory,  the  prophets  are  made  to  assume 
from  first  to  last,  and  the  relation  in  which  they  are 
made  to  stand  towards  the  whole  movement  of  legisla- 
tion, are  so  peculiar  that  the  subject  requires  some  special 
treatment. 

(1.)  We  have  already  considered  the  contention  that 
in  all  those  passages  in  the  earlier  writing  prophets  in 
which  law  or  laws  are  mentioned,  the  reference  is  only 
to  oral  and  not  to  written  law.  The  priests,  we  are 
told,  like  the  prophets,  gave  forth  their  toroth  or  in- 
structions orally  to  the  people;  and  the  substance  of 
the  priestly  Torah  was  chiefly  moral,  but  partly  also 
ceremonial,  relating  to  things  clean  and  unclean.  "What- 
ever became  of  the  concrete  toroth  on  those  subjects,  we 
are  assured  that  the  practice  of  the  priests  at  the  altar 
was  never  matter  of  instruction  to  the  laity,  and  was 
not  written  down  in  a  codified  shape.^  It  is  not  made 
very  clear  in  all  this  wherein  the  Torah  of  the  priests 
differed  from  tliat  of  the  prophets;  nor  is  it  made  clear 
to  w^hat  extent,  if  any,  the  priests  wrote  down  their  moral 
and  ceremonial  Torah.  What  we  have  particularly  to  do 
with  here,  however,  is  the  attitude  of  the  prophets  to  the 
law.  It  cannot  be  denied  that,  in  the  expressions  of  a 
general  kind  which  they  employ,  they  show  a  high  re- 
spect for  the  Torah  of  the  priests.  This,  however,  say 
the  critical  historians,  was  the  moral  part  of  the  priestly 
instruction,  and  it  is  strenuously  maintained  that  the 
prophets,  down  to  the  time  of  Jeremiah,  denied  the  divine 
authority  of  sacrifice  and  ritual  laws.  The  situation,  as 
I  understand  the  contention,  was  this  :  In  pre-exilic  an- 
tiquity, when  the  worship  of  the  Bamoth  was  the  rule, 

^  Wellhauscn,  p.  59. 


442  Law  and  Prophecy. 

the  main  thing  in  the  service  was  not  the  rite,  but  the 
deity  to  whom  the  service  was  rendered.  The  historical 
books  that  date  from  pre-exilic  time — the  books  of  Judges, 
Samuel,  and  Kings — exhibit  great  varieties  in  the  modes 
of  sacrifice,  some  of  which  may  correspond  to  tlie  law  of 
the  Pentateuch,  while  others  certainly  deviate  widely  from 
it,  proving  that  there  was  no  fixed  rule.^  The  prophetical 
books  also,  "  in  their  polemic  against  confounding  worsliip 
with  religion,"  while  they  "  reveal  the  fact  tliat  in  their 
day  the  cultus  was  carried  on  with  the  utmost  zeal  and 
splendour,"  show  that  this  high  estimation  rested,  not  on 
the  opinion  that  the  cultus  came  from  Moses,  but  simply 
on  the  belief  that  Jahaveh  must  be  honoured  by  His  de- 
pendants, just  like  other  gods,  by  means  of  offerings  and 
gifts.^  "According  to  the  universal  opinion  of  the  pre- 
exilic  period,  the  cultus  is  indeed  of  very  old  and  (to  the 
people)  very  sacred  usage,  but  not  a  Mosaic  institution ; 
the  ritual  is  not  the  main  thing  in  it,  and  is  in  no  sense 
the  subject  with  which  the  Torah  deals."  ^  So  that, 
in  a  word,  as  far  as  regards  the  ceremonies  of  worship, 
*' the  distinction  between  legitimate  and  heretical  is  alto- 
gether wanting ; "  *  the  theory  of  an  illegal  praxis  is  im- 
possible, and  the  legitimacy  of  the  actually  existing  is 
indisputable.^  The  prophets,  therefore,  when  they  rebuke 
the  people  for  their  sacrifices  and  offerings,  are  not  to  be 
understood  as  reproving  them  for  the  corruption  of  a  pure 
law  of  worship  that  existed,  but  as  expressing  disapproval 
of  the  whole  sacrificial  system,  as  a  thing  of  mere  human 
device,  and  destitute  of  divine  sanction.  Not  only  do 
they  show,  by  thus  speaking,  that  there  was  no  law  such 
as  the  Levitical  Code  in  their  day ;  but  even  the  prophets, 

i  Wellhausen,  p.  55.  2  i^id.,  p.  5(5.  »  Ibid.,  p.  59. 

4  Ibid.,  p.  65.  5  Ibid.,  p.  60. 


Isaiah  and  Ritual.  443 

before  the  time  of  Josiah,  have  nothing  to  say  against  the 
local  sanctuaries  (so  long  as  they  are  devoted  to  the  wor- 
ship of  the  national  God),  a  proof  that  the  Deuteronomic 
Code  did  not  come  into  existence  till  that  period,  and 
much  more  a  proof  that  it  had  no  divine  sanction.  The 
prophets,  in  a  word,  appear  as  the  exponents  of  a  tendency 
tlie  very  opposite  of  the  legalising  tendency  which  brought 
legal  Codes  into  existence. 

Great  stress,  in  this  argument,  is  laid  upon  the  declara- 
tion of  Isaiah.  His  antipathy  to  the  whole  ritual  system 
finds  expression,  it  is  said,  in  the  well-known  passage  in 
the  first  chapter  of  his  book :  "  To  what  purpose  is  the 
multitude  of  your  sacrifices  unto  me  ?  saith  Jahaveh :  I 
am  weary  with  the  burnt-offerings  of  rams,  and  the  fat  of 
fed  beasts ;  and  I  delight  not  in  the  blood  of  bullocks,  and 
of  lambs,  and  of  he-goats.  When  ye  come  to  look  upon 
my  face,  who  hath  required  this  at  your  hands,  to  trample 
my  courts  ? "  This  expression,  Wellhausen  asserts  with 
confidence,  "  the  prophet  could  not  possibly  have  uttered 
if  the  sacrificial  worship  had,  according  to  any  tradition 
whatever,  passed  for  being  specifically  Mosaic."^  But 
what  then  becomes  of  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  which 
was  surely  at  this  time  accepted  as  an  authoritative  Code, 
and  is  expressly  ascribed  to  Moses  ?  It  says,  in  the  law 
of  worship  which  the  critics  appeal  to  as  existing  up  to 
Josiah's  time,  and  therefore  prevailing  in  Isaiah's  days: 
"An  altar  of  earth  thou  shalt  make  unto  me,  and  shalt 
sacrifice  tliereon  thy  burnt-offerings,  and  thy  peace-offer- 
ings, thy  sheep,  and  thine  oxen."  ^  Or  if  it  is  maintained 
that  Isaiah  condemned  even  that  early  piece  of  legislation, 
surely  the  argument  here  employed  proves  too  much.  For 
it  would  make  the  prophet  condemn  also  the  Sabbath 
1  Wellhausen,  p.  58.  2  Exod.  xx.  24. 


444  Law  and  Propliecy. 

as  a  piece  of  will-worship,  and  even  reject  prayer  as  a 
thing  displeasing  to  God,  since,  in  the  same  connection, 
he  says:  "The  new  moons  and  Sabbaths,  the  calling  of 
assemblies,  I  cannot  away  with ;  .  .  .  and  when  ye  spread 
forth  your  hands,  I  will  hide  mine  eyes  from  you ;  yea, 
when  ye  make  many  prayers,  I  will  not  hear."^ 

If  we  allow  to  Isaiah  the  perception  of  a  difference 
between  sacrifice  as  an  oims  opeixitum,  and  sacrifice  as  the 
expression  of  a  true  and  obedient  heart — and  surely  the 
prince  of  the  prophets  was  capable  of  drawing  such  a 
distinction — his  words  have  a  definite  and  precise  mean- 
ing, eminently  suited  to  the  times  and  circumstances  in 
which  he  lived.  If  we  take  them  as  a  statement  in  this 
bald  form,  of  the  history  of  religious  observances  in  Israel, 
they  are  emptied  of  their  ethical  as  well  as  their  rhetori- 
cal force,  and  land  us  in  a  position  which  is  incomprehen- 
sible in  the  circumstances.  For  what,  is  it  conceived 
or  conceivable,  was  the  worship  of  a  true  Israelite  in 
Isaiah's  days  ?  Is  there  any  outward  worship  left  that 
a  man  like  Isaiah  himself  could  take  part  in  ?  Is 
this  prophet  to  be  refined  away  into  a  kind  of  free- 
thinker who  stood  aloof  from  all  outward  observances 
of  religion,  who  "  never  went  to  church,"  as  the  modern 
phrase  goes,  because  the  whole  of  the  ordinary  service 
of  worship  was  a  mere  human  device  ?  Or  if  a  prophet 
might  thus  attain  to  a  position  independent  of  the  out- 

^  Isa.  i.  13,  15.  Konig  (Hauptprobleme,  p.  90)  endeavours  to  make  a 
distinction  between  "I  cannot  away  with"  (v.  13)  as  applied  to  the 
Sabbath,  and  "  who  hath  required?"  (v.  12)  as  applied  to  offerings  ;  and 
Bays  that  a  "cautious  exegesis"  shows  that  the  things  enumerated  in  vv. 
11-16  were  looked  upon  as  matters  of  worship,  coming  in  different  senses 
and  degrees  from  God.  "  Cautious  "  is  scarcely  the  term  that  I  should 
apply  to  such  exegesis  ;  for  I  doubt  very  much  whether  such  fine  distinc- 
tions ever  occurred  to  the  minds  of  the  prophets. 


Micah  and  Sacrifice.  445 

ward  aids  of  devotion,  what  of  the  common  people  ?  What 
worship  is  to  be  allowed  to  them  at  all,  if  all  that  went 
on  at  the  Temple  is  condemned,  and  if  the  condemnation 
means  what  the  critics  say  ?  For,  be  it  observed,  Isaiah 
is  not  indifferent  to  these  things,  as  things  that  might  be 
good  enough  for  the  vulgar,  but  were  too  gross  for  him. 
Whatever  the  things  are  to  which  he  is  referring,  he 
refers  to  them  with  displeasure ;  and  if  there  is  a  possi- 
bility of  legitimate  worship  at  all,  we  must  regard  his 
words  not  as  a  condemnation  of  that,  but  of  the  spirit  in 
which  it  was  performed,  or  of  the  abuses  with  which  it 
was  surrounded.  A  mere  historical,  unimpassioned  state- 
ment as  to  the  origin  of  sacrificial  worship  is  out  of  the 
question. 

Again,  it  has  been  said  that  the  words  of  Micah,  the 
contemporary  of  Isaiah,  prove  the  same  thing :  "  He  hath 
showed  thee,  0  man,  what  is  good ;  and  what  doth  the 
Lord  require  of  thee,  but  to  do  justly,  and  love  mercy, 
and  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God  ? "  (Micah  vi.  8),  Says 
Wellhausen,  "Although  the  blunt  statement  of  the  con- 
trast between  cultus  and  religion  is  peculiarly  prophetic, 
Micah  can  still  take  his  stand  upon  this :  '  It  hatli  been 
told  thee,  0  man,  what  Jehovah  requires.'  It  is  no  new 
matter,  but  a  thing  well  known,  that  sacrifices  are  not 
what  the  Torah  of  the  Lord  contains,"  ^  which  is  not  a 
lair  interpretation  of  the  prophet's  words,  for  the  com- 
mand to  do  justly  and  love  mercy  does  not  exclude  a 
command  to  offer  sacrifice.  But  this  is  the  very  prophet 
who,  in  almost  identical  terms  with  Isaiah,  anticipates 
the  time  when  the  mountain  of  the  Lord's  house  shall  be 
exalted,  and  all  nations  shall  flow  into  it.  So  that  the 
argument,  if  pushed  to  its  conclusion,  would  prove  that 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  58. 


446  Law  and  Prophecy. 

these  two  prophets  denied  the  divine  authority  of  all  out- 
ward observances  of  religion ;  and  yet  would  ascribe  to 
them  the  absurdity  of  maintaining  great  sanctity  for  a 
Temple  and  an  altar,  whose  service  was  otiose  or  alto- 
gether improper. 

In  the  same  way  appeal  is  made  to  the  well-known  dec- 
laration of  Hosea,  "  I  desired  mercy  and  not  sacrifice " 
(Hosea  vi.  6).  One  would  have  thought  that  the  prophet's 
meaning  was  made  quite  clear  by  the  words  that  follow, 
"and  the  knowledge  of  God  more  than  burnt-offerings." 
I  confess  I  am  astonished  that  a  passage  like  this  should 
be  insisted  upon  by  professional  students  of  Hebrew  ;  but 
it  would  almost  seem  that,  in  their  anxiety  to  establish  a 
hypothesis,  some  can  not  only  ignore  poetry  and  senti- 
ment in  the  Hebrew  writings,  but  even  shut  their  eyes 
to  plain  matters  of  grammar  and  rhetoric.  The  slightest 
reference  to  the  usage  of  the  language  will  suffice  to 
show  how  little  worth  is  the  argument  based  on  the 
text  before  us.  "When  we  read  in  Prov.  viii.  10,  "Ee- 
ceive  my  instruction  and  not  silver,  and  knowledge  rather 
than  choice  gold,"  we  perceive  that  the  two  forms  of 
expression  explain  one  another.  Who  would  conclude 
from  the  phrase  "  and  not  silver  "  that  it  was  absolutely 
forbidden  in  all  circumstances  to  take  silver?  Or  again, 
when  we  read,  "Let  a  bear  robbed  of  her  whelps  meet 
a  man  in  the  way,  and  not  a  fool  in  his  folly"  (Prov. 
xvii.  12),  does  any  one  conclude  that  it  was  of  no  con- 
sequence what  became  of  a  man  exposed  to  the  attack 
of  a  wild  beast,  so  long  as  he  kept  out  of  tlie  way  of  a 
fool  ?  The  prophet,  in  brief,  says  only  what  Samuel  said 
long  before  him,  "  To  obey  is  better  than  sacrifice,  and  to 
hearken  than  the  fat  of  rams,"  though  the  seer  of  Eamah 
himself  offered  sacrifices  as  a  regular  religious  observance. 


The  Worship  at  the  Temple.  447 

What  he  did,  no  doubt  his  successors  in  the  prophetic 
office  countenanced  ;  and  there  is  absolutely  no  proof  that, 
up  to  the  time  of  Josiah,  the  Temple  at  Jerusalem  was  a 
place  at  which  no  purer  service  was  known  than  that 
practised  at  the  high  places.  The  writer  of  the  books  of 
the  Kings,  though  his  testimony  cannot  be  pressed  here, 
had  some  good  reason  for  singling  out  certain  kings  who 
introduced  heathen  corruptions  into  the  Temple  service, 
and  instancing  the  attempts,  successful  or  otherwise,  to 
abolish  them  by  others.  To  suppose  that  he  acted  ar- 
bitrarily in  this  matter  is  to  criticise  away  his  accounts 
altogether,  and  would  leave  us  no  assurance  of  the  truth 
of  even  the  account  of  Josiah's  reformation.  There  is  no 
reason  to  doubt  that  at  certain  times,  and  under  the  more 
faithful  of  the  kings,  the  worship  of  the  central  sanctuary 
at  Jerusalem  was  observed  with  something  of  the  purity 
and  regularity  which  were  maintained  after  the  time  at 
which  the  critics  allow  the  reform  took  place.  To  take 
the  case  of  Isaiah,  can  any  of  the  modern  school  tell  us 
what  led  that  prophet  to  clothe  the  vision  of  his  inaugu- 
ration to  the  prophetic  work  (Isa.  vi )  in  the  dress  which 
he  gives  to  it,  and  why,  if  the  Temple  service  was  full  of 
abominations,  its  furniture  and  arrangements  should  have 
been  chosen  for  the  imagery  of  one  of  his  highest  flights 
of  prophetic  inspiration  ?  What  was  the  altar  from  which 
a  live  coal  was  taken,  the  touching  of  his  lips  by  wliicli 
was  to  purge  his  iniquity  ?  One  would  have  thought 
there  was  more  need — if  the  modern  position  is  correct — 
for  the  purifying  influence  to  proceed  in  the  opposite  direc- 
tion, from  the  prophet  to  the  altar,  and  that  the  message 
delivered  to  the  prophet  should  have  been  like  that  of 
the  prophet  against  the  altar  of  Bethel  (1  Kings  xiii.  2). 
But  we  are  told  confidently  that  Jeremiah  gives  con- 


448  Law  and  Prophecy. 

elusive  proof  of  the  modern  theory  when  he  says  (vii.  22) : 
"  For  I  spake  not  unto  your  fathers,  nor  commanded  them 
in  the  day  that  I  brought  them  out  of  the  land  of  Egypt 
concerning  burnt-offerings  or  sacrifices  :  but  this  thing  I 
commanded  them,  saying,  Hearken  unto  my  voice,  and  I 
will  be  your  God,  and  ye  shall  be  my  people."  Well,  if 
we  are  bound  at  all  hazards  to  take  words  literally,  the 
words  are  literally  true ;  for,  according  to  tlie  account  of 
Exodus  itself,  the  command  in  the  day  of  the  deliverance 
from  Egypt  was  not  a  command  in  regard  to  burnt-offer- 
ings and  sacrifices.  The  people  at  that  crisis  had  to  make 
the  grand  venture  of  faith  and  obedience ;  and  not  till 
they  were  delivered  and  safe  in  the  desert  was  there  any 
"  command  concerning  "  a  system  of  sacrifices.  It  is  this 
idea  that  is  working  in  the  prophet's  mind,  though  I  do 
not  believe  he  imagined  for  a  moment  that  his  words 
would  be  taken  as  a  historical  statement  of  the  late  origin 
of  sacrifices,  or  of  the  time  of  its  introduction  at  all.  The 
polemic  was  not  as  to  the  date  of  introduction  of  sacrifice, 
but  as  to  its  rightful  place  and  meaning.  Jeremiah  was 
not  opposed  to  all  ritual  service,  as  Graf  himself  admitted. 
His  words  are  just  an  expansion  of  the  fundamental 
prophetic  dictum  of  Samuel  that  to  obey  is  better  than 
sacrifice.  The  thing  he  is  insisting  on,  as  all  the  prophets 
do,  is  the  utter  worthlessness  of  sacrifices  and  offerings 
without  the  obedience  of  tlie  life  and  the  fidelity  of  the 
heart.  And  to  make  the  words  mean  more  is  to  make 
Jeremiah  declare  that  up  to  liis  time  there  was  no  law  for 
worship  whatever,  and  yet  worship  at  that  period  without 
authorised  ceremonial  and  sacrifice  is  inconceivable. 

(2.)  On  the  other  hand,  we  are  told  by  the  advocates  of 
the  modern  theory  that  it  was  through  proj)hetic  influence 
that  the  Code  of  Deuteronomy  was  brought  into  existence 


The  Prophets  and  Legalism.  449 

and  recognition,  and  that  tlie  movement,  once  set  agoing, 
resulted  also  in  the  codification  of  the  Levitical  law ;  that, 
in  fact,  the  prophets  seeking  to  give  permanent  form  and 
authoritative  sanction  to  their  teaching,  embodied  it  in 
the  form  of  a  code ;  that  thus  prophecy  had  its  final  de- 
velopment, but  in  reaching  this  development  destroyed 
itself.  Speaking  of  the  manner  in  which  the  Deuter- 
onomic  Code  was  brought  in,  Wellhausen  says:  "Witli 
the  tone  of  repudiation  in  which  the  earlier  prophets,  in 
the  zeal  of  their  opposition,  had  occasionally  spoken  of 
practices  of  worship  at  large,  there  was  nothing  to  be 
achieved ;  the  thing  to  be  aimed  at  was  not  abolition  but 
reformation,  and  the  end,  it  was  believed,  would  be  helped 
by  concentration  of  all  ritual  in  the  capital"  (p.  26).  He 
admits,  indeed,  that  merely  to  abolish  the  holy  places,  and 
only  to  limit  to  one  locality  the  cultus,  which  was  still  to 
be  the  main  concern,  was  by  no  means  the  wish  of  the 
prophets — though  it  came  about  as  an  incidental  result  of 
their  teaching  (p.  23).  This,  however,  seems  to  be  hardly 
consistent  with  the  preceding  position ;  nor  do  I  think  it 
is  reconcilable  witli  a  fair  interpretation  of  the  declara- 
tions of  the  prophets  on  the  subject.  The  influence  of  the 
prophets  cannot  be  said  to  have  been  at  any  time  in  the 
direction  of  the  enforcement  of  external  observances,  ex- 
cept in  so  far  as  they  urged  the  people  to  that  change  of 
heart  which  would  result  in  such  observances ;  and  there 
is  no  proof  from  their  own  writings  that  they  knew  of  any 
way  of  curing  the  people's  godlessness  but  the  exercise  of 
repentance  and  the  return  to  heart  religion. 

If  there  is  any  one  class  in  the  Old  Testament  liistory 
to  whom  we  must  accord  the  title  of  earnestness  and 
sincerity  of  purpose,  it  is  the  prophets.  The  most  super- 
ficial reader  must  perceive  their  deep  religious  devotion, 

2  F 


450  Laiu  and  Prophecy. 


their  freedom  from  self-seeking  and  time-serving.  It  is 
difficult,  however,  to  reconcile  the  admission  of  these 
qualities  with  the  characters  they  exhibit  and  the  parts 
they  are  made  to  play  on  the  modern  theory.  "Well- 
hausen,  for  example,  attempts  to  prove  that  Isaiah  never 
laboured  for  the  removal  of  tlie  Bamoth,  but  only  for  their 
purification  ;  ^  although  he  himself  tells  us  that  all  writers 
of  the  Chaldean  period  associate  monotheism  in  the  closest 
way  with  unity  of  worship  (p.  27),  and  admits  that  Isaiali 
himself  gave  a  special  pre-eminence  in  his  estimation  to 
Jerusalem,  and  that  "  even  as  early  as  the  time  of  Mieah 
the  temple  must  have  been  reckoned  a  house  of  God  of  an 
altogether  peculiar  order,  so  as  to  make  it  a  paradox  to 
put  it  on  a  level  with  the  Bamoth  of  Judah."  ^  And  yet 
these  two  prophets  are  relied  upon  as  leading  witnesses  to 
prove  that  the  whole  ritual  system  was  not  only  without 
authority,  but  positively  displeasing  to  God.     The  ques- 

^  The  reason  given  for  this  statement  should  not  he  passed  over  ;  it  ia 
characteristic  of  Wellhausen's  method  of  proof :  "  In  one  of  his  latest 
discourses  his  anticipation  for  that  time  of  righteousness,  and  the  fear  of 
God  which  is  to  dawn  after  the  Assyrian  crisis,  is  :  '  Then  shall  ye  defile  the 
silver  covering  of  your  graven  images,  and  the  golden  plating  of  your  molten 
images ;  ye  shall  cast  them  away  as  a  thing  polluted  :  Begone  !  shall  ye  say 
unto  them '  (xxx.  22).  If  he  thus  hopes  for  a  purification  from  supersti- 
tious accretions  of  the  places  where  Jehovah  is  worshipped,  it  is  clear  that 
lie  is  not  thinking  of  their  total  abolition"  (p.  25  f.)  We  will  leave  the 
circles  in  which  "  appreciation  of  scientific  results  can  be  looked  for  at 
all"  (p.  9),  to  determine  here  whether  the  "accretions"  are  merely  the 
plating  of  the  images — as  those  who  believe  image  worship  was  the  autho- 
rised religion  would  no  doubt  say — or  the  images  themselves,  as  Well- 
hausen  himself  seems  to  imply  (p.  46),  in  which  case  one  would  suppose 
there  would  be  little  use  of  these  places  of  worship  at  all.  Pyramids 
of  "scientific  results"  are  poised  upon  such  precarious  points,  but  I 
take  it  that  Isaiah  was  not  one  to  concern  himself,  like  the  scribes  and 
Pharisees,  with  such  distinctions  (Matt.  xxiv.  16-18).  See  before,  chap. 
ix.  p,  228  ;  comp.  p.  235  f. 

2  Wellhausen,  p.  25. 


Inconsiste7icy  of  Jeremiah.  451 

tion  is  whether  the  inconsistency  is  to  be  attributed  to  the 
prophets  or  to  be  charged  against  a  vicious  theory ;  for 
other  prophets  fare  no  better  at  the  hands  of  the  critics. 
For,  let  us  come  down  to  Jeremiah,  who  was  contem- 
porary with  the  Deuteronomic  reformation,  and  who  has 
even  been  supposed  to  have  had  a  hand  in  the  composi- 
tion of  the  book  or  the  Code.  We  find  that  prophet,  so 
far  from  trusting  to  the  mere  acceptance  of  a  written  code 
for  reformation,  going  beyond  any  of  his  predecessors  in 
the  inwardness  of  his  teaching.^  He  has  reached,  finally, 
the  conception  of  personal  heart  religion  as  a  thing  far 
before  a  mere  national  adoption  of  a  national  God,  and 
speaks  of  the  law  written  in  the  heart.  How  a  person 
with  such  views — not  to  speak  of  his  conviction  that  law 
had  no  divine  sanction — should  labour  to  elaborate  a  book 
like  Deuteronomy,  and  trust  to  its  reception  to  bring 
about  the  state  of  things  he  desired,  it  is  very  hard  to 
understand.  Or  if  Jeremiah  did  indeed  help  the  intro- 
duction of  Deuteronomy,  he  at  the  same  time  went  far 
beyond  it  in  the  unfolding  of  its  teaching ;  and  what  then 
becomes  of  the  assertion,  that  the  codifying  of  the  law  put 
an  end  to  the  free  activity  of  the  prophets  ?  ISTo  wonder 
that  prophecy,  in  reaching  this  position,  destroyed  itself, 
for  the  prophets  had  stultified  themselves.  There  is  here 
an  exhibition  of  inconsistency  which  requires  explanation, 
and  the  explanation  that  is  given  is  peculiar.  "In  his 
early  years,"  we  are  told,^  "  Jeremiah  had  a  share  in  the 
introduction  of  the  law ;  but  in  later  times  he  shows  him- 
self little  edified  by  the  effects  it  produced  ;  the  lying  pen 
of  the  scribes,  he  says,  has  written  for  a  lie  (Jer.  viii.  7-9)." 
To  say  nothing  of  the  very  doubtful  determination  of  early 
and  late  in  Jeremiah's  utterances  on  this  subject,  we  are 

1  Jer.  in.  16;  xxxi.  31  ff.  ^  Wellhauscn,  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  403. 


452  Law  and  Pro;phecy, 

asked  to  believe  not  only  that  the  prophet  had  a  share  in 
the  introduction  of  a  code  which  pronounces  a  curse  on 
those  who  shall  not  observe  it,  and  afterwards  turned  his 
back  upon  all  ritual  law,  but  also  that  he  allowed  the  book 
of  his  prophecies  to  go  forth  (Jer.  xxxvi.  4,  5,  32)  with 
the  record  of  his  inconsistency  on  its  face.  Had  not  the 
prophet  of  Anathoth  trouble  enough  in  his  lifetime  that 
he  must  be  thus  tortured  in  modern  days  ?  Or  are  we  to 
say  that  a  character  so  vacillating  deserved  all  that  he 
suffered?  Yet  Vatke  would  build  him  a  sepulchre,  by 
claiming  him  as  the  earliest  witness  for  the  late  origin  and 
unhistorical  character  of  the  Mosaic  law.^  It  will  hardly 
be  denied  that  the  prototype  of  modern  critics  is  made  to 
appear  in  rather  a  sorry  character ;  for,  if  all  this  is  true, 
he  utters  his  own  condemnation  (Jer.  xiv.  14).  Again,  it  is 
not  easy  to  comprehend  how  Ezekiel,  pining  over  the  low 
condition  of  his  countrymen  in  exile,  and  reaching  those 
spiritual  intuitions  expressed  in  his  vision  of  the  dry 
bones,  and  the  waters  issuing  from  the  sanctuary,  should 
at  the  same  time  believe  that  the  remedy  for  his  people's 
misfortunes  was  to  be  found  in  a  minute  observance  of 
ceremonial  ordinances,  and  occupy  himself  with  a  codifi- 
cation— on  a  limited  scale — of  Temple  ritual,  as  if  the 
putting  down  of  Levites  and  the  putting  up  of  priests  was 
to  bring  about  a  national  revival.  Nor  does  he,  in  point  of 
fact,  represent  things  in  that  order.  All  these  things  are 
good  enough  when  the  people  are  of  one  mind  in  serving 
their  Lord,  and  desire  to  give  expression  to  their  active 
religious  life:  they  are  absolutely  powerless  to  produce 
such  a  life,  as  all  the  prophets  well  knew. 

In  order  to  perceive  how  the  prophets  stood  to  the  law, 
we  must  take  into  account  their  whole  position  as  religious 

1  Bibl.  Theol.,  p.  220  f.;  Bredenkamp,  Gesetz  und  Propheten,  p.  106. 


National  Standing  of  Prophets.  453 

teachers,  and  their  relation  to  the  religious  movement  of 
the  nation.  Kuenen,  as  we  have  seen  in  another  connec- 
tion,^ insists  upon  the  common  ground  on  which  people 
and  prophets  stood — viz.,  that  Jahaveh  was  Israel's  God, 
and  Israel  Jahaveh's  people.  This,  he  says,  can  be  traced 
back  to  Moses  himself,  whose  "  great  work  and  enduring 
merit "  it  was  "  not  that  he  introduced  into  Israel  any  par- 
ticular religious  forms  and  practices,  but  that  he  estab- 
lished the  service  of  Jahveh  among  his  people  upon  a 
moral  footing.  *  I  will  be  to  you  a  God,  and  ye  shall  be 
to  me  a  people.'  So  speaks  Jahveh,  through  Moses,  to  the 
Israelitish  tribes.^  This  reciprocal  covenant  between  Jah- 
veh and  His  people,  sealed  by  the  deliverance  from  Egyp- 
tian bondage,  is  guaranteed  by  the  fact  that  the  ark, 
Jahveh's  dwelling-place,  accompanies  the  Israelites  on 
the  journey  in  the  desert,  and  afterwards  remains  estab- 
lished in  their  midst."  ^  Kuenen  thus  admits  that  there 
was  a  "reciprocal  covenant  between  Jahveh  and  His 
people,"  sealed  by  a  historical  occurrence,  and  vouched 
for  by  the  existence  of  a  religious  symbol.  "We  have 
already  argued  (p.  338  f.)  that  such  a  covenant  is  incon- 
ceivable without  some  attendant  ceremonial  institutions; 
and  at  this  initial  point,  it  seems,  we  may  find  the  ex- 
planation of  the  real  attitude  of  the  prophets  to  the  law. 
Kuenen  himself  hints  at  it  when  he  says,  "  On  their  part 
the  people  must  remain  faithful  to  the  conditions  of  the 
pact  concluded  with  Jahveh.  These  conditions  are  prin- 
cipally moral  ones.  This  is  the  great  thing.  Jahveh  is 
distinguished  from  the  rest  of  the  gods  in  this,  that  he 
will  be  served,  not  merely  by  sacrifices  and  feasts,  but  also, 

^  See  chap.  xii.  p.  307. 

2  Exod.  vi.  7  ;   Levit.  xxvi.  45  ;  Deut.  xxix.  13. 

3  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  pp.  292,  293. 


454  Law  and  Proj)liccy^ 

nay,  in  the  first  place,  by  the  observance  of  the  moral 
commandments  which  form  the  chief  contents  of  the  ten 
words." ^  Quite  so;  and  this  is  just  what  all  the  Biblical 
writers  say.  But  why  slip  in  this,  "  not  merelyby  sacri- 
fices and  feasts,"  if  these  are  not  only  not  commanded,  but 
actually  wrong?  There  can  be  no  doubt  whatever  that 
the  people  regarded  sacrifices  and  ceremonies  as  obser- 
vances well-pleasing  to  God,  and  signs  of  their  adherence 
to  the  Covenant.  It  is  doubtful  how  a  people,  situated  as 
they  were,  could  have  kept  up  their  recollection  of  the 
Covenant  relation  without  outward  service  and  ceremony. 
Have  we,  in  this  nineteenth  century,  got  so  far  that  we 
can  dispense  with  outward  observances  which  we  regard 
as  divinely  appointed  or  divinely  approved  ?  Or  if  the 
prophets  disagreed  with  this  deeply  rooted  feeling  in  the 
popular  mind,  inseparably  linked  with  that  conviction 
which  Kuenen  says  prophets  and  people  held  in  common, 
they  not  only  fail  to  give  us  clear  indications  of  the  fact, 
but  they  are  in  opposition  to  the  writers  of  prophetic  spirit 
and  to  the  prophetic  men  who  guided  the  nation  in  early 
times.  For  from  the  very  beginning  sacrifice  appears  as 
a  regular  and  acceptable  expression  of  devotion.  The 
earliest  of  all  the  codes,  the  book  of  the  Covenant,  occur- 
ring in  a  prophetic  writing,  and  containing  prescriptions 
of  a  ceremonial  as  well  as  of  a  moral  kind,  proves  the 
close  union  of  morality  and  observance  from  the  first,  and 
shows  that,  in  the  constitution  of  Israel,  and  in  the  con- 
ception of  the  nation,  the  two  are  inseparable.  And  if, 
according  to  Kuenen,  the  people  were  right  in  the  matter 
of  fact  as  to  a  covenant  dating  from  the  time  of  Moses, 
and  had,  from  that  time  onwards,  practised  sacrifices  and 
other  observances  as  marks  of  their  allegiance  to  their 

1  Relig.  of  Israel,  vol.  i.  p.  293.     Cf.  Allan  Menzies,  p.  24. 


The  Times  of  JosiaJi.  455 

covenant  God,  it  will  require  more  than  the  citation  of  a 
few  rhetorical  passages  to  prove  that  the  prophets  regarded 
sacrifice  and  observance  in  themselves  as  wrong,  or  of  mere 
human  device.  Kuenen  himself,  in  the  passage  quoted  from 
him,  gives  the  key  to  the  true  exegesis  of  such  passages ; 
"  Not  merely  by  sacrifices  and  feasts,  but  also,  nay,  in  the 
first  place,  by  the  observance  of  the  moral  command- 
ments." The  prophets  are,  in  fact,  in  all  such  polemic, 
combating  the  germ  of  wliat  became  the  monstrous  doc- 
trine of  Eabbinism,  that  Israel  was  created  in  order  to 
observe  the  law. 

This  attitude  of  the  prophets  to  the  law  is  exhibited  in 
the  circumstances  of  the  time  of  Josiah  which  culminated  in 
his  reformation.  When  it  is  said  that  the  worship  of  the 
high  places  had  become  so  corrupt  that  a  reformation  was 
felt  to  be  necessary,  let  us  be  careful  to  understand  what 
tliat  means.  It  was  not  that  at  many  high  places  there  was 
rendered  to  Jahaveli  a  worship  which  should  have  been 
rendered  to  Him  at  one  central  sanctuary.  The  worship 
of  the  Bamoth  was  part  of  a  great  national  defection.  The 
needed  reformation  had  much  more  to  do,  as  Wellhausen 
admits,  than  to  gather  into  one  central  place  all  the  abuses 
of  many  high  places ;  and  it  is  altogetlier  a  weak  under- 
statement of  the  case  to  say  that  "  even  Jerusalem  and 
the  house  of  Jehovah  there  might  need  some  cleansing, 
but  it  was  clearly  entitled  to  a  preference  over  the  obscure 
local  altars."  ^  There  was  required  above  all  things  a 
reformation  of  religion,  not  merely  of  worship;  and  the 
prophets  were  not  the  men — Jeremiah  certainly  was  not 
the  man — to  rest  satisfied  with  anything  else.  The  mes- 
sage of  Huldah  the  prophetess,  on  the  occasion  of  the 
discovery  of  the  law-book,  foretold  "  evil  upon  this  place," 

1  Wellhausen,  p.  27. 


456  Law  and  Prophecy. 

"  because  they  have  forsaken  me  and  have  burned  incense 
unto  other  gods,  that  they  might  provoke  me  to  anger 
with  all  the  work  of  their  hands"  (2  Kings  xxii.  17). 
And  so  we  see  that  the  work  done  by  Josiah  was  of  a 
thorough  kind ;  the  co-operation  of  priests,  prophets,  and 
people  was  indicative  of  a  movement  of  the  national  con- 
science; and  the  evils  put  away  are  of  a  much  more 
serious  kind  than  merely  the  worshipping  of  Jahaveh 
at  various  high  places.  "  The  king  commanded  Hilkiah 
the  high  priest,  and  the  priests  of  the  second  order,  and 
the  keepers  of  the  door,  to  bring  forth  out  of  the  temple 
of  Jahaveh  all  the  vessels  that  were  made  for  Baal,  and 
for  the  Asherah,  and  for  all  the  host  of  heaven,"  &c.,  &c. 
(2  Kings  xxiii.  4  ff.),  beginning  with  a  cleansing  of  the 
central  sanctuary  itself.  And  let  it  not  be  supposed  that 
these  were  recognised  up  till  this  time  as  elements  of  the 
national  worship.  The  book  of  the  Covenant  itself — 
which  is  supposed  to  have  been  in  existence  for  two 
hundred  years — had  said,  immediately  before  the  words 
relied  on  as  allowing  the  multiplicity  of  sanctuaries :  "  Ye 
shall  not  make  other  gods  with  me ;  gods  of  silver  or  gods 
of  gold,  ye  shall  not  make  unto  you  "  (Exod.  xx.  23) ;  and 
had  reiterated  the  warning  against  making  "mention  of 
the  name  of  other  gods "  (Exod.  xxiii.  13),  and  bowing 
down  to  the  gods  of  the  nations,  or  serving  them,  or  doing 
after  their  works,  but  "  thou  shalt  utterly  overthrow  them, 
and  break  in  pieces  their  pillars  "  (Exod.  xxiii.  24).  These 
things  were  indeed  thoroughly  inconsistent  with  the  whole 
position  which — by  the  confession  of  the  nation  as  implied 
in  the  prophetic  utterances^Israel  sustained  to  Jahaveh  ; 
and  if  the  sin  of  them  did  not  come  home  to  them  through 
prophetic  rebukes  or  through  their  knowledge  of  the  book 
of  the  Covenant,  the  discovery  of  a  hundred  other  codes 


Time  of  the  Restoration.  457 

could  not  have  convinced  them.  The  truth  is  that  the 
evils  had  pressed  upon  the  hearts  of  good  men  for  long 
before :  Hezekiah  had  partially  done  what  Josiah  now 
did  more  thoroughly ;  and  the  powerful  upheaval  of  pub- 
lic sentiment  that  was  produced  cannot  have  an  adequate 
cause  in  a  mere,  or  in  a  primary,  desire  to  centralise  the 
worship.  In  a  word,  the  idea  of  worship  in  one  place 
cannot  be  taken  by  itself  and  apart  from  the  nature  of 
the  worship  which  Jahaveh  claimed.  The  tendency  to- 
wards reform  was  there  before  the  alleged  contrivance  of 
producing  a  code  was  resorted  to.  The  book  did  not  pro- 
duce what  was  the  essential  part  of  the  reform ;  and  the 
reform  is  quite  conceivable  on  the  supposition  of  the  dis- 
covery of  any  code,  and  had  already  proceeded  a  great  way 
before  tlie  book  of  the  law  was  brought  to  light. 

Nor  were  the  circumstances  materially  different  when 
the  later  reformation  took  place  after  the  exile.  The 
little  community  under  Joshua  and  Zerubbabel  had  re- 
turned to  Jerusalem,  and  held  a  struggling  existence  for 
more  than  half  a  century  ^  before  Ezra  made  his  appear- 
ance with  his  book,  which  is  said  to  have  been  the  Pen- 
tateuch law  now  first  come  into  existence.  It  was  the 
sense  of  their  national  position  and  national  calling  that 
had  brought  them  thither ;  they  did  not  come  for  the  pur- 
pose of  observing  a  ritual  law,  but  for  the  purpose  of 
keeping  alive  a  nationality  and  exhibiting  their  faith  in 
the  divine  promises.  This  much  the  teaching  of  the 
prophets  had  effected,  though  the  fruits  of  prophetic 
teaching  were   tardy,  and   brought   to   maturity  by  the 

1  Edict  of  Cyrus,  538.  The  return  of  exiles  under  Zerubbabel  and 
Joshua  was  in  B.C.  536,  and  twenty  years  later  (Haggai  and  Zechariah) 
the  Temple  was  consecrated.  The  arrival  of  Ezra  was  in  458.  Law 
promulgated,  444.     Cf.  Wellhausen,  p.  492  ff. 


458  Law  and  Prophecy. 

sufferings  of  the  exile.  I  am  willing  to  admit  that  the 
influence  of  Ezekiel  was  a  powerful  factor  in  leading  to 
the  restoration,  but  I  see  another  direction  of  his  influence 
tlian  that  of  codification  of  law.  As  in  a  former  chapter 
I  maintained  that  the  doubtful  or  figurative  language  of 
a  writer  should  be  interpreted  by  his  clearer  and  more 
unequivocal  utterances,  so  I  should  say  here  that  we  are 
to  look  not  to  the  programme  of  legislation  which  Ezekiel 
saw  in  vision,  but  to  the  reviving  Spirit,  breathing  upon 
the  dry  bones,  as  the  motive  power  which  was  uppermost 
in  the  mind  of  the  prophet  of  the  exile. 

The  more  closely  the  matter  is  looked  at,  the  more 
clearly  will  it  appear  that  it  is  impossible  to  dissever  the 
moral  from  the  ceremonial  part  of  the  law  of  Israel. 
Moses  himself  is  represented  as  a  prophet ;  ^  and  prophecy 
has  its  legal,  just  as  the  law  has  its  prophetical,  side. 
The  idea  of  holiness  is  common  to  both.  The  law  links 
even  the  meanest  ceremonial  observance  with  this  moral 
attribute :  "  Ye  shall  be  holy  men  unto  me,  neither  shall  ye 
eat  any  flesh  that  is  torn  of  beasts  in  the  field ; "  ^  and  pro- 
phecy recognises  a  clean  and  an  unclean  land  and  offer- 
ings.^ Even  the  prophet  who  speaks  most  exclusively  of 
the  Holy  One  of  Israel  (Isa.  Iv.  5)  expresses  abhorrence 
of  the  eating  of  swine's  flesh  and  so  forth  (Isa.  Ixv.  4 ; 
Ixvi.  17).  The  rules  for  purifications  and  sacrifices  in- 
dicate clearly,  not  only  that  these  observances  were  of  an 
educative  character,  but  also  that  they  did  not  come  in 
the  place  of  moral  requirements,  as  if  they  were  ends  in 
themselves.  The  sacrifices  and  offerings  do  not  effect 
atonement  for  moral  offences,  nor  do  they  constitute  the 

1  Deut.  xviii.  15  ;  Hosea  xii.  13. 

2  Exod.  xxii.  31.     Comp.  Levit.  xi.  44-47;  xix.  2,  15-19. 
'  Amos  vii,  17 :  Hosea  ix.  3-5. 


The  Sign  and  its  Significance.  459 

whole  religious  service  of  Israel.  The  sins  atoned  for  are 
those  that  affect  the  theocratic  relation  of  the  people,  the 
offerings  are  the  outward  signs  of  the  inward  homage  due 
to  Jahaveh.  We  need  not,  indeed,  wonder  that  the  pro- 
phets, in  the  situation  in  which  they  found  themselves 
before  the  exile,  laid  so  little  stress  on  the  ritual  wor- 
ship, for  it  was  powerless  to  cure  the  evils  which  they 
deplored.  To  what  purpose  indeed  would  it  have  been 
for  a  preacher  of  righteousness  like  Amos,  addressing  a 
people  who  trampled  on  the  most  fundamental  laws  of 
humanity,  to  urge  to  the  more  sedulous  performance  of 
outward  acts  of  worship;  or  for  a  prophet  with  insight 
into  God's  love  such  as  Hosea  enjoyed,  to  direct  a  people 
openly  apostate  and  idolatrous  in  heart  to  begin  with  a 
mere  reformation  of  cultus  ?  Isaiah  again  and  his  fellow- 
prophets  of  the  south  had  before  them  a  people — such  as 
all  ages  and  all  countries  have  produced — who  thought  to 
make  up  for  wickedness  of  life  and  hollowness  of  heart 
by  loud-sounding  devotion  and  ostentatious  worship ;  and 
it  is  no  wonder  that  such  men  contemptuously  scouted 
the  whole  system  of  outward  observance,  which  was  that 
and  nothing  more.  It  was  needless  to  insist  upon  the 
sign  when  the  thing  signified  was  wanting — for  the  out- 
ward form  was  then  a  gross  lie;  and  just  because  the 
mission  of  the  prophets  was  to  insist  upon  the  underlying 
moral  requirements  of  the  law,  for  that  reason  they  made 
light  of  its  ceremonial  elements,  which  had  no  basis  nor 
reason  for  existence  apart  from  these  moral  requirements. 
On  the  other  hand,  we  find  the  prophet  Haggai,  when 
his  contemporaries  in  the  coldness  of  their  devotion  com- 
mitted the  opposite  mistake  from  pre -exilic  Israel,  re- 
proving them  for  the  scantiness  of  their  offerings ;  althougli 
both  he  and  Zechariah,  who  laboured  for  the  restoration 


4  60  law  and  Prophecy. 

of  the  Temple  and  its  service,  are  quite  clear  as  to  the 
supreme  duty  of  heart  religion  and  the  inutility  of  a 
mere  opics  operatum}  The  position  of  Malachi  is  to  be 
particularly  noted,  because  in  him  we  find  a  distinctly 
ceremonial  tone  (chap,  i.),  and  because  he  belongs  to  the 
time  of  the  alleged  introduction  of  the  Priestly  Code.  It 
is  very  hard  to  believe  that  a  priesthood  such  as  he 
chides  (in  chap,  ii.)  was  fit  to  be  trusted  with  the  task 
of  elaborating  an  authoritative  code.^  It  is  much  more 
likely  that  the  prophet  reproves  them  for  deviation  from 
a  standard  that  was  far  older  and  much  higher.  In  any 
case  it  is  to  be  observed  that  this  prophet,  though  tech- 
nical as  any  priest  could  be,  is  at  one  with  all  the  prophets 
as  to  the  essentials  of  religion. 

It  is  inaccurate,  therefore,  to  represent  the  prophetic  and 
priestly  classes  as  opposed,  and  to  make  the  history  turn 
upon  the  preponderance  of  the  one  over  the  other.  There 
was  no  greater  antagonism  than  that  which  in  a  normal 
condition  of  things  exists  between  the  inner  truth  and 
its  outward  manifestation  —  which,  however,  becomes 
pronounced  when  the  outward  expression  is  made  the 
whole,  or  is  represented  as  having  the  vitality  and  the 
importance  of  the  inner  truth.  Such  times  there  were 
in  the  history  of  Israel,  as  in  the  religious  history  of  all 
nations,  when  the  priesthood,  peculiarly  liable  to  settle 
down  to  formality  and  routine,  and  peculiarly  liable  to 
the  temptations  besetting  any  privileged  order,  encouraged 
the  people  to  boast,  saying,  "  The  temple  of  the  Lord  are 
we,"  or  even  exercised  their  office  for  their  own  gain.  At 
such  times  the  prophetic  voice  was  raised  in  scathing 
rebukes,  whose  terms  almost  lead  one  to  conclude  that 
in   the    prophetic   estimation   the   whole   priestly   order, 

1  Haggai  ii.  12  f. ;  Zech.  vii.  6,  9,  10. 

2  Bredcnkamp,  Gesetz  und  Propheten,  p.  120. 


Comhmahon  of  Priests  and  Propliets^i^^^j^29X^'2'' 

and  all  the  ceremonies  over  wLicli  they  presided,  were  in 
their  essence  wrong.  Yet  even  in  the  midst  of  such 
rebukes  there  is  a  tone  of  respect  for  the  law,  and  a 
recognition  of  the  sacred  function  of  the  priest.  So  also 
when  we  come  to  any  crisis  in  the  history  in  which  a 
positive  advance  is  made,  we  perceive  that  it  is  not  by 
a  conquest  of  one  party  over  the  other,  but  by  the  hearty 
co-operation  of  both,  that  the  movement  of  reform  or 
advance  succeeds.  Moses,  the  forerunner  of  the  prophets, 
has  Aaron  the  priest  beside  him;  and  Joshua  is  still 
surrounded  by  priests  in  the  carrying  out  of  his  work. 
Samuel  is  both  priest  and  prophet;  David  and  Solomon 
in  the  same  way  are  served  or  admonished  by  both.  In 
Josiah's  time  we  see  the  priest  Hilkiah  as  eager  for  the 
introduction  of  reform  as  the  prophet  or  prophets  who 
prepared — as  is  alleged — the  Code  which  was  to  be  re- 
cognised;^ although  the  Code  was  not  to  be  to  the  ad- 
vantage of  the  Jerusalem  priesthood,  according  to  the 
modern  view  of  it,  for  it  was  to  bring  to  the  capital  all 
the  priests  of  the  high  places  who  should  so  desire,  and 
thus  reduce  the  emoluments  and  lower  the  prestige  of 
the  ministers  of  the  central  sanctuary.  Jeremiah  was  of 
the  priests  of  Anathoth,  and  Ezekiel,  too,  was  a  priest- 
prophet.  So  that  at  every  turning-point  in  the  nation's 
life,  when  an  advance  was  made,  or  a  return  to  a  better 
mind,  the  two  classes  are  seen  working  in  harmony. 
Which  is  just  saying  in  other  words  that  the  better  mind 

^  And  so  some  would  have  it  that  the  Code  is  a  composite  work.  "  The 
Deuteronomic  torah,"  says  Cheyne,  "is  in  fact  the  joint  work  of  at  least 
two  of  the  noblest  members  of  the  prophetic  and  the  priestly  orders." 
— Jeremiah,  His  Life  and  Times,  p.  63  f.  One  may  obtain,  from  this, 
some  idea  of  the  critical  principles  on  which  the  separation  of  sources  is 
effected,  and  may  be  inclined  to  ask,  if  two  writers  of  different  tendencies 
could  work  so  harmoniously  here,  why  similar  tendencies  should  be  put  so 
far  apart  elsewhere. 


462  Law  and  Pro]phecy. 

resulted  in  a  better  life,  and  that  faithfulness  of  heart  was 
expressed  in  the  better  observance  of  the  authoritative 
forms  of  religion. 

On  this  subject,  as  on  many  others  connected  with  the 
history  of  Israel,  we  must  beware  of  concluding  that 
distinctions  which  we  can  abstractly  draw,  and  of  which 
the  history  shows  the  possibility,  were  actually  drawn  at 
the  time.  "The  passion  of  the  human  mind,"  says 
Dr  A.  B.  Davidson,  "  is  for  distinctions  and  classification. 
Broad  distinctions  are  rare  in  the  Old  Testament.  The 
course  of  revelation  is  like  a  river,  which  cannot  be  cut 
up  into  sections.  The  springs  at  least  of  all  prophecy  can 
be  seen  in  the  two  prophets  of  northern  Israel ;  but  the 
rain  which  fed  those  fountains  fell  in  the  often  unrecorded 
past."  ^  On  reviewing  the  history  we  may  perceiA^e  the 
two  currents  of  influence,  the  priestly  and  the  prophetic, 
and  in  analysing  the  combined  stream  of  national  life  we 
may  be  able  to  separate  them  in  thought  and  assign 
different  effects  to  them  respectively.  But  we  are  not  for 
all  that  to  jump  to  the  conclusion  that  priests  and  prophets 
were  arrayed  in  hostile  camps,  and  existed  like  two  parties 
in  a  modern  state.  The  prophets  are  as  free  in  their 
denunciations  of  prophets  when  these  are  unfaithful,  as 
they  are  in  their  rebukes  of  the  excesses  of  the  priests. 
The  truth  is,  that  on  this  low  view  of  a  struggle  of  parties, 
the  history  of  Israel  is  as  devoid  of  interest,  as  it  is  inca- 
pable of  explanation.  When  it  did  come  to  a  struggle  of 
parties  in  Israel,  in  the  later  stages  of  the  history,  when 
some  leaned  to  Egypt  and  some  to  Assyria,  the  days  of 
Israel's  independence  were  numbered.  The  thing  that 
made  two  parties  in  ancient  Israel  was  not  the  question  of 
ritual  or  no  ritual,  not  the  question  of  written  Torah  or 
oral  Torah,  but  the  question  of  fidelity  to  their  national 

^  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  vi.  p.  163. 


*  Legalism  not  caused  hy  Prophets.  463 

God,  and  purity  from  heathen  contamination.  The  daily 
observances  of  the  Temple  might  go  on  unrecorded  for 
years — as  I  believe  they  went  on  far  more  regularly  than 
is  now  supposed — and  call  for  no  remark.  But  as  soon 
as  these  were  rested  in  as  the  essentials  of  religion,  or 
improved  and  adorned  by  a  tampering  with  heathen  ways 
and  an  aping  of  idolatrous  rites,  then  the  prophetic  voice 
was  raised,  and  in  such  terms  that  we  perceive  how  all 
the  time  these  men  knew  wherein  the  essentials  of  true 
religious  worship  consisted. 

Though,  therefore,  the  legalistic  tendency  set  in  after  the 
great  prophets  had  done  their  work,  the  two  things  were 
not  cause  and  effect.  It  was  not  the  "  prophets  that  were 
the  destroyers  of  old  Israel,"  but  it  was  Israel  that  de- 
stroyed itself.  A  mistake  may  be  very  readily  commit- 
ted from  taking  too  narrow  a  view  of  development,  and 
assuming  that  what  is  immediately  subsequent  to  some- 
thing else  results  naturally  from  it.  There  are  rc-actions 
and  recoils  as  well  as  direct  influences  in  the  same  line. 
The  true  succession  of  Old  Testament  prophets  is  found 
in  the  Gospel,  not  in  the  scribes.  Though  Jesus  Christ 
followed  the  scribes,  He  did  not  develop  their  teaching. 
He  did  not,  however,  deny  its  historical  basis.  He  was 
the  direct  successor  of  the  prophets,  but  He  assumed  and 
took  for  granted  that  law  preceded  prophecy,  and  that 
law  was  also  of  divine  authority.  From  His  polemic 
with  the  scribes  and  Pharisees  of  His  day,  one  might 
hastily  claim  Him  as  maintaining  the  human  origin  of 
the  Codes,  and  the  natural  basis  of  sacrifice.  Yet,  though 
He  rejected  the  traditions  and  commandments  of  men,  He 
attended  even  to  the  ceremonial  of  the  law,  and  in  His 
life  and  teaching  treated  the  law  as  given  through  Moses 
by  divine  authority. 


464 


CHAPTER    XVIIL 


CONCLUSION. 

The  modern  theory  is  "thorough-going,"  hut  docs  not  do  justice  to  the  fads 
of  the  case — Its  arbitrary  treatment  of  the  writers  and  books  of  the  Old 
Testament — Its  weakness  "as  a  whole,"  when  great  crises  and  turning- 
points  are  to  be  explained — Does  not  go  to  the  core  of  the  religion,  but 
dwells  on  external  details— Rejecting  the  supernatural,  it  is  itself  un- 
natural—Even  on  its  literary  side,  not  so  strong  as  it  seems — Objection 
to  the  Biblical  theory  that  it  docs  not  make  room  for  development — Ob- 
jection answered :  true  development  exhibited — The  appeal  to  religions 
of  "primitive  peoples"  considered — The  Semitic  disposition  to  religion 
— Reference  to  early  chapters  of  Genesis — Comparative  religion — Bear- 
ing of  the  whole  subject  on  Inspiration. 

I  We  have  thus  endeavoured  to  estimate  fairly  the  two 
[theories  of  Israel's  earlier  religious  history.  N'o  attempt 
has  been  made  to  present  all  the  details  in  which  the 
theories  are  opposed ;  but  consideration  has  been  fixed  on 
the  fundamental  lines  and  underlying  principles.  Our 
conclusion  has  been,  that  the  Biblical  theory,  when  not 
burdened  with  assumptions  with  which  it  has  been  often 
"  traditionally  "  encumbered,  will  stand  the  test  of  a  sober 
and  common-sense  criticism,  as  an  account  of  the  exis- 
tence in  Israel,  in  early  or  so-called  pre-prophetic  times, 
of  very  distinctive  religious  conceptions  and  religious 
ordinances,    obtained    in    connection    with   well-marked 


A  tliorougli-going  Hypothesis.  465 

historical  events   and  under  well  -  determined   historical 
conditions. 

The  modern  critical  theory,  if  it  has  been  able  to  point 
out  difficulties  connected  with  the  Biblical  theory,  espe- 
cially as  it  has  been  traditionally  maintained,  raises  diffi- 
culties of  a  much  more  serious  kind  in  the  way  of  its  own 
acceptance.  At  first  sight,  it  has  all  the  attractions  of  a 
"good-going"  hypothesis;  for  it  promises  to  exhibit  the 
growth  of  religious  conceptions  and  religious  observances 
from  the  lowest  stage  to  their  finally  developed  phases ; 
and,  considering  the  long  course  which  Israel's  history  ran, 
and  the  broad  field  available  for  observation,  this  is  what 
we  should  expect  to  find  practicable.  But  the  theory  is 
too  thorough-going,  for  it  goes  in  the  teeth  of  evident 
obstacles,  and  refuses  to  bend  its  way  to  embrace  plain 
facts;  and  what  we  want  is  a  theory  that  will  give  the 
best  explanation  of  things  that  cannot  be  disputed.  Were 
it  the  case  that  we  knew  practically  nothing  of  the  de- 
velopment of  Israel's  religion  in  Palestine,  it  might  be 
very  well  for  a  theory  to  sketch  a  scheme  which  would 
be  another  contribution  to  the  histories  of  religious 
thought.  But  there  are  books,  there  are  men,  there  are 
abiding  effects  to  be  accounted  for ;  and  in  face  of  these 
the  modern  theory  shows  its  weakness.  We  have  con- 
ducted our  inquiry  on  the  narrowest  possible  grounds, 
by  restricting  ourselves  to  compositions  whose  dates  are 
assigned  by  the  critics  themselves  ;^  and  on  that  narrow 
ground  I  am  prepared  to  rest  my  objections  to  the  two 
cardinal  points  of  tlie  theory.  On  the  one  hand,  I  main- 
tain that  the  earliest  writing  prophets,  Amos  and  Hosea, 
give  clear  evidence  that  the  ethic  and  spiritual  nature 
of  the  religion  was  apprehended  and  firmly  possessed  in 

1  See  Note  XXXI. 
2  G 


466.  Conclusion. 

their  day,  and  long  before  it — evidence  which  can  only 
be  set  aside  by  a  forced  interpretation  of  some  passages 
and  an  excision  of  others.  On  the  other  hand,  I  maintain 
that  the  existence,  at  what  is  called  the  earliest  literary 
age,  of  these  same  books  and  likewise  of  the  book  of  the 
Covenant  in  the  heart  of  a  Jehovistic  writing,  ascribing  to 
Moses  authoritative  and  specifically  religious  institutions, 
relating  to  sacrifice  and  ritual  as  well  as  idolatry  and 
morals,  is  irreconcilable  with  the  fundamental  positions 
of  the  modern  theory  on  the  subject  of  law. 

Wellhausen,  in  one  place,  says  it  would  not  be  surpris- 
ing, considering  the  whole  character  of  the  polemic  against 
Graf's  hypothesis,  if  the  next  objection  should  be  that  it 
is  not  able  to  construct  the  history.^  My  great  objection 
to  the  theory  is,  not  that  it  cannot  construct  a  history,  for 
the  ingenuity  of  critical  writers  is  equal  to  that,  but  that 
it  does  not  leave  sound  materials  out  of  which  a  cred- 
ible history  can  be  constructed.  The  hypothesis  of  Graf 
carries  with  it  the  assumption  that  the  narratives  accom- 
panying the  laws  of  the  Pentateuch  are  not  history  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  word  at  all,  but  the  product  of  late 
imaginative  writers,  and,  in  short,  fictitious.  And  not 
only  are  the  narratives  of  the  Pentateuch  so  treated; 
the  historical  and  prophetical  books  are  in  a  similar 
manner  discredited,  so  as  to  be  admissible  as  testimony 
only  after  they  have  been  expurgated  or  adjusted  on 
the  principles  of  the  underlying  theory.  The  historical 
books,  we  are  told,  were  written  long  after  the  events 
they  relate  ;  and  even  when  they  contain  the  records 
of  historical  facts,  these  records  are  overlaid  with  later 
interpretations  of  the  facts,  or  even  glossed  over  to 
obliterate  them.      Even   the  prophetical  books   are   not 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  367,  footnote. 


Treatment  of  the  Documents.  467 

to  be  relied  upon  to  determine  the  religious  history ; 
for  the  books,  in  the  first  place,  have  undergone  great 
alterations  in  the  process  of  canonisation — and  in  the 
second  place,  even  where  there  is  an  unambiguous  de- 
claration of  a  prophet  as  to  a  certain  sequence  of  events, 
it  is  open  to  us  to  accept  or  reject  his  statement  on 
"critical"  grounds.  Modern  critical  writers,  in  fact,  can 
scarcely  lay  their  hands  on  a  single  book  and  say.  Here 
is  a  document  to  be  relied  upon  to  give  a  fair,  un- 
biassed, untarnished  account  of  things  as  they  were.  The 
blemishes  that  criticism  seeks  to  remove  are  not  such  as 
may  be  contracted  by  ordinary  ancient  documents  in  the 
course  of  their  literary  transmission.  They  have  come 
into  the  documents  in  the  interests  of  a  theory  (and 
indeed  they  have  a  wonderful  coherence  in  tenor),  and 
by  another  theory  they  are  to  be  eliminated.  The  literary 
task  of  critical  writers,  therefore,  is  not  so  much  to  dis- 
cover and  account  for  facts  of  a  history  long  past,  as  to 
Recount  for  the  account  which  later  writers  give  of  them. 
The  history  which  Wellhausen  constructs  is  in  fact  a  "  his- 
tory of  the  tradition";  and  in  many  cases  it  seems  a  labori- 
ous endeavour  to  show  how  something  very  definite  grew 
out  of  nothing  very  appreciable.  The  further  one  follows 
the  processes,  the  more  apparent  it  becomes  that  the  en- 
deavour is  not  so  much  to  find  out  by  fair  interpretation 
what  the  writer  says,  as  to  discover  his  motive  for  saying 
it,  or  what  he  wishes  to  conceal.  He  belongs  to  some 
class,  or  has  some  political  expediency  to  serve;  or  he 
lives  in  a  circle  of  certain  ideas,  and  these  tendencies  are 
made  to  give  birth  to  the  facts,  instead  of  being,  as  is 
more  likely,  the  result  of  the  facts.  "The  idea  as  idea 
is  older  than  the  idea  in  history,"  says  Wellhausen ;  ^  and 

1  Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  36. 


468  Conclusion. 

he  is  continually  applying  this  maxim  in  the  sense  that 
when  an  idea  takes  possession  of  the  leading  men  of  a 
certain  time,  they  straightway  proceed  to  invest  it  with 
a  historical  character,  by  placing  its  exemplification  or 
embodiment  back  at  some  remote  period  of  the  history. 
I  think  the  maxim  is  better  illustrated  in  the  processes  of 
Wellhausen  and  his  school,  who  first  find  an  "  idea,"  and 
then  seek  by  main  force  to  read  it  into  the  unwilling 
documents.  In  this  way  a  history  is  no  doubt  con- 
structed, but  the  supporting  beams  of  it  are  subjective 
prepossessions,  and  the  materials  are  only  got  by  dis- 
crediting the  sources  from  which  they  are  drawn. 

I  say  this  is  a  very  serious  attitude  to  assume  towards 
the  writers  of  the  Old  Testament  books,  if  it  can  in  any 
degree  be  justified ;  and  if  it  is  not  well  justified,  it  is  a 
very  serious  objection  to  any  theory  tliat  requires  it.  The 
men  who  moulded  the  history  of  Israel  were  the  men  who 
had  most  to  do  with  the  production  and  preservation  of 
the  national  literature.  We  know  what  sort  of  men  they 
were.  But,  on  the  modern  theory,  the  greatest  characters 
in  Israel's  history,  instead  of  being  spontaneous  actors  in 
a  great  life-drama,  are  merely  posturing  and  acting  a  part 
on  a  stage.  "What  they  give  us  as  history  is  merely  their 
fond  idea  of  what  history  should  have  been  ;  in  many 
cases  it  is  not  even  so  much,  but  pure  invention  to  give 
a  show  of  antiquity  to  what  had  to  be  accounted  for  and 
magnified  in  their  own  day.  History  was  never  made  in 
this  way.  Men  that  make  history  such  as  Israel's  his-) 
tory  was,  are  intent  on  great  purposes,  moved  by  noble-; 
ends ;  but  what  we  are  asked  to  contemplate  at  the  great 
crises  and  turning-points  is  a  set  of  men  thinking  how 
they  will  elaborate  a  scheme  of  history.  Fictions  become 
the  greatest  facts,  and  tlie  French  critic  has  carried  out 


Imaginative  Writers.  469 

the  theory  to  its  true  conclusion  when  he  ascribes  the 
great  bulk  of  the  Hebrew  literature  to  the  free  creation 
of  a  school  of  theologians  after  the  exile.  "  The  theo- 
logians and  writers  of  that  time,"  he  says,  "have  been 
able  to  give  such  a  character  of  life  to  the  creations  of 
their  genius  that  posterity  has  been  thereby  deceived,  and 
has  believed  in  a  Moses  living  1500  years  before  our  era, 
whereas  this  Moses  was  only  created  in  the  fourth  cen- 
tury, and  had  no  more  reality  than  an  incomparable 
fiction."  ^  And  thus  the  great  merit  of  the  Hebrew  race, 
the  great  quality  for  which  they  have  distinguished 
themselves  in  the  world,  is  their  power  of  imagination ! 
Such  a  mode  of  viewing  the  Old  Testament  writings,  as 
the  conduct  of  the  critics  shows,  leaves  individual  critics 
to  construct  each  his  own  scheme  of  the  history.  To 
most  people  it  will  appear  that,  if  such  a  mode  of  treat- 
ment is  once  introduced,  the  inquiry  into  the  true  course 
of  Israel's  history  is  a  matter  of  the  utmost  uncertainty ; 
to  many  the  inquiry  would  probably  cease  to  have  much 
practical  interest. 

It  is  to  be  lamented,  I  think,  that  now  at  the  very  close 
of  the  nineteenth  century  a  tone  of  criticism  should 
reassert  itself  which  is  out  of  harmony  with  the  liberal 
views  with  which  we  have  been  priding  ourselves  we  had 
learned  to  regard  all  nations.  So  much  has  our  knowledge 
of  the  religions  of  the  world  extended,  and  our  sympathy 
for  the  struggles  of  the  religious  instinct  been  stirred, 
that  we  might  expect  from  leaders  of  investigation  in  these 
subjects  a  disposition   to   look  for  the  best  side  of   all 

^  Maurice  Vemes,  Rdsultats  de  I'Ex^ese  Biblique,  p.  227.  Of  course 
the  conclusions  of  Vernes  are  disowned  by  the  prevailing  school,  but  the 
'principle  of  his  criticism,  the  imagination  of  writers  of  the  exilian  age,  ia 
frankly  avowed  by  Wellhausen,  p.  419.     See  Note  XXXII. 


470  Conclusion^ 

religions,  and  to  put  the  most  favourable  construction  on 
the  efforts  of  their  founders.  It  is  not  so  long  ago  that  it 
used  to  be  the  orthodox  thing  to  characterise  the  prophet 
of  Arabia  as  a  designer,  a  schemer,  an  impostor ;  but  it  had 
come  to  be  generally  admitted  that,  in  his  early  struggles 
at  least,  Mohammed  was  a  sincere  inquirer,  following  out 
lines  of  thought  and  belief  that  existed  in  a  somewhat 
narrow  circle  before  him.  Kuenen,  however,  has  practi- 
cally come  back  to  the  old  position.  According  to  this 
view,  Mohammed  had  an  eye  to  Christians  and  Jews,  and 
counted  upon  the  latter  particularly  for  recognition  of  his 
teaching.  And  so  he  framed  his  device  of  that  milla  of 
Ibrahim,  of  which  at  first  he  never  thought,  for  "the 
opinion  that  Mohammed  came  to  awaken  and  to  restore 
what  already  existed  amongst  his  people,  if  only  as  a 
faint  reminiscence  of  a  distant  past,  finds  no  support  in 
the  Qoran  when  read  in  the  light  of  criticism."  ^  Great 
is  criticism  of  the  modern  critics !  It  has  discovered 
another  scheme,  like  the  schemes  and  programmes  and 
fictions  of  the  Hebrew  writers.  And  so  the  boasted  en- 
lightenment and  toleration  of  the  nineteenth  century 
comes  round  again  to  explain  the  origin  of  religions 
by  the  fanaticism  of  prophets  and  the  frauds  of  priests.^ 
But,  it  is  said,  the  theory  must  be  taken  as  a  whole, 
and  apart  from  varieties  of  opinion  that  may  be  held  on 
details.  It  is  just  when  thus  taken  that  I  find  the  great- 
est difficulty  in  accepting  it,  because  there  is  so  marked 
a  disagreement  between  the  whole  and  its  component 
parts.     There  are  certain  great  outstanding  facts  whose 

^  National  Religions,  p.  19. 

2  A  melancholy  example  is  furnished  in  Lippert's  'Allgemeine  Ge- 
Bchichte  des  Priesterthums,'  published  as  recently  as  1884.  Konig,  Falsche 
Extreme,  p.  2. 


Development  not  made  out,  471 

existence  cannot  be  ignored, — such  as  the  prophetic  activ- 
ity in  Israel,  the  belief  in  one  national  or  one  sole  Deity, 
the  national  testimony  to  an  early  history  of  great  mo- 
ment, the  ascription  of  legislation  to  Moses ;  and  the 
incompetence  of  the  modern  theory  to  set  these  in  their 
true  perspective  is  very  striking.  On  the  one  hand, 
the  Biblical  theory  gives  definite  connections  for  events, 
and  historical  occasions  for  transitions  and  advances.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  modern  theory  is  strong  in  minute 
analysis,  but  weak  in  face  of  great  controlling  facts.  It 
will  laboriously  strain  out  a  gnat  in  the  critical  process 
of  determining  the  respective  authors  of  a  complex  passage, 
but  when  it  comes  to  a  real  difficulty  in  history  it  boldly 
swallows  the  camel  and  wipes  its  mouth,  saying,  "  I  have 
eaten  nothing."  Nabiism,  or  the  prophetic  activity,  even 
Jahavism  itself,  are  borrowed  from  the  Canaanites  or 
Kenites;  and  when  it  is  asked  why  the  Canaanites  or 
Kenites  did  not  reach  the  same  truth  that  Israel  attained, 
i^a^get  no  answer.  And  when  we  ask  what  then  had 
Israel  to  distinguish  it,  the  feeble  answer  is  returned  that 
when  Israel  (for  no  reason  stated)  assumed  Jahaveh  as 
their  national  deity,  they  also  resolved  and  were  told  that 
He  only  (for  no  reason  assigned)  was  to  be  their  only 
God.  And  when  the  undoubtedly  pure  and  high  concep- 
tions entertained  by  the  prophets  are  pointed  out,  and  an 
explanation  demanded  of  their  origin,  we  are  told  that  a 
"  conception  "  was  "  absorbed  "  by  the  prophets  and  came 
out  in  this  purified  form ;  but  we  get  no  sufficient  account 
of  the  faculty  that  enabled  the  prophets  to  absorb  this  and 
that,  and  give  forth  a  product  which  is  entirely  unlike  the 
thing  absorbed.  In  the  same  way  no  satisfactory  account 
is  given  of  the  ascription  of  law  to  Moses,  and  no  firm 
basis  for  the  various  Codes.    The  theory  is,  again,  strong  in 


472  Conclusion. 

details  of  analysis,  but  weak  in  face  of  a  historical  event. 
No  explanation  is  given  of  the  origin  of  what  is  declared 
to  be  the  first  of  all  the  Codes.  "When  a  great  reform  of 
religion  such  as  took  place  in  Josiah's  days  has  to  be  ex- 
plained, instead  of  historical  criticism  reconstructing  an 
intelligible  historical  situation,  we  are  shown  how  a  book 
was  constructed  which  brought  it  about.  Though  all  the 
scathing  rebukes  and  denunciations  of  the  prophets  up 
to  this  time  had  been  powerless  to  wean  the  people  from 
their  idolatries,  the  production  in  some  secret  conclave 
of  this  book,  telling  unheard-of  stories  about  Moses,  and 
laying  down  on  his  authority  laws  which  were  then  partly 
impracticable,  rouses  a  whole  nation.  And  again,  in  the 
captivity,  after  the  Temple  had  been  destroyed  and  the 
people  scattered  for  their  sins,  the  main  thing  the  best 
of  them  think  about  is  the  gathering  together  of  the 
ritual  practices  of  the  priests,  and,  instead  of  being 
humbled  for  their  transgressions,  imagining  ever  so  many 
great  things  their  nation  had  been  and  done  in  the  early 
ages.  Upon  the  strength  of  this  a  colony  braves  the 
liardships  of  a  long  journey  from  Babylon  to  Jerusalem 
to  set  up  the  worship  which  they  had  agreed  was  the  right 
ritual  to  practise.  This  falling  back  at  every  stage  upon 
the  introduction  of  some  new  factor,  which  does  not 
grow  out  of  the  history  itself,  but  is  made  to  give  a  turn 
to  the  whole  history,  is  artificial.  Jahaveh,  introduced 
from  the  Kenites,  becomes  the  distinctive  deity  of  Israel. 
Prophetism  imitated  from  the  raving  of  Canaanites  be- 
comes the  glory  of  Israel.  Codes  of  laws,  gathered  up 
from  a  haphazard  praxis  or  devised  as  reforming  schemes, 
become  so  sacred  that  the  nation  will  battle  for  them  as 
for  existence.  In  short,  we  are  promised  the  exhibition 
of  a   course  of   development,   and   at   decisive   turning- 


The  Root  of  the  Matter.  473 

points  tlie  theory  of  development  fails.  It  may  seem 
at  first  siglit  remarkable  that  there  should  be  so  mucli 
consensus  of  critical  opinion  in  regard  to  these  out- 
standing and  testing  points  of  the  history.  But  if  we 
look  more  closely  we  shall  observe  that,  after  all,  the 
consensus  is  confined  to  the  underlying  postulate,  which 
of  course  controls  all  the  details.  The  theory  itself  is 
clear  and  thorough  enough,  and  of  course  it  hangs  to- 
gether as  a  whole.  But  it  does  not  hold  the  parts  to- 
gether, because  it  does  not  supply  the  proper  nexus  that 
unites  them  in  an  orderly  historical  development.  There 
must  be  a  bond  of  a  more  vital  fibre,  a  force  more  deeply 
inherent,  which  the  modern  theory  has  not  penetrated  to 
nor  unfolded,  to  account  for  a  religious  and  spiritual 
movement,  which,  looking  to  the  broad  field  on  which  it 
is  displayed  and  the  diversified  circumstances  under  which 
it  took  place,  is  nothing  short  of  majestic.  The  self- 
styled  "  higher  "  criticism  is  indeed  not  high  enough,  or, 
we  should  perhaps  more  appropriately  say,  not  deep 
enough  for  the  problem  before  it. 

The  strongest  objection,  in  fact,  to  the  theory  "as  a 
whole  "  is,  that  it  hardly  at  all  touches  the  religion  round 
which  the  whole  history  properly  turns.  Superstition 
tliere  has  always  been  among  all  peoples,  and  no  doubt 
there  was  much  superstition  mixed  up  with  the  popular 
religion  of  ancient  Israel.  But  religion  is  not  necessarily 
superstition,  nor  does  it  necessarily  flow  from  it  in  natural 
development.  Unquestionably  there  was  among  the  best 
souls  of  the  nation  of  Israel  in  early  times — and  these 
may  have  been  a  larger  proportion  of  the  people  than  we 
generally  suppose,  as  the  answer  to  Elijah  (1  Kings  xix. 
18)  in  his  day  indicated — a  strong  current  of  true  re- 
ligious life,  to  the  fountains  of  which  we  must  reach,  if 


474  Conclusion. 

we  would  understand  this  wonderful  history.  To  this 
aspect  of  the  subject,  however,  the  modern  theory  pays 
far  too  little  regard.  Take,  for  example,  the  treatment  of 
the  book  of  Psalms  now  in  vogue  in  the  higher  circles 
of  criticism.  One  would  have  thought  that  if  anywhere 
the  inquirer  into  the  history  of  religious  thought  and  life 
would  find  valuable  "  sources,"  it  would  be  in  this  col- 
lection of  the  sacred  and  national  songs  of  Israel.  But 
Wellhausen,  for  example,  who  boasts  that  he  could  under- 
stand the  history  of  Israel  without  the  book  of  the  Law, 
can  also  dispense  with  the  book  of  the  Psalms.  In  the 
"  index  of  passages  discussed  "  appended  to  his  '  History  of 
Israel,'  there  is  only  one  reference  to  one  psalm  (Ps.  Ixxiii.), 
which  too,  of  course,  is  placed  very  late  in  date,  I  think 
it  a  positive  objection  to  the  theory,  not  so  much  that 
it  brings  down  the  bulk  of  the  psalms  to  post-exilian 
times,  but  that  it  is  able  to  dispense  with  them  as 
materials  for  a  history  of  the  older  religion  of  Israel,  and 
to  relegate  them  to  a  time  at  which,  according  to  its  own 
showing,  the  religion  had  taken  a  more  mechanical  and 
formal  phase.  It  is  now  the  fashion  to  speak  of  the 
Psalter  as  the  psalm-book  of  the  second  Temple,  in  the 
sense,  not  that  it  is  a  collection  of  older  religious  com- 
positions brought  together  by  the  piety  of  a  later  gener- 
ation, but  that  they  were  composed  purposely  for  use  in 
public  worship.  Thus,  by  one  stroke,  the  tongue  of  ancient 
Israel  is  struck  dumb,  as  the  pen  is  dashed  from  its  hand, 
these  artless  lyrics  are  deprived  of  their  spontaneousness, 
and  a  great  gulf  is  fixed  between  the  few  which  a  niggardly 
criticism  admits  to  be  of  early  date,  and  the  full  volume 
of  devotional  song  which  in  many  tones  was  called  forth 
by  the  shifting  situations  of  olden  times.  Of  course 
tlie  hypothesis   of   a   low   religious   stage   in   pre  -  exilic 


Beligion  in  Olden  Times.  475 

times  demands  this,  but  it  is  an  additional  difficulty 
which  the  theory  raises  in  the  way  of  its  own  acceptance ; 
for  even  if  the  psalms  are  late,  the  influence  that  started 
and  produced  them  must  lie  early  and  must  lie  deeper 
than  in  legal  ordinances  and  formal  ceremonies.  So  far 
as  concerns  their  higher  tone,  which  is  supposed  to  mark 
a  late  date,  it  is  not  higher  than  what  we  meet  with 
in  the  very  earliest  writing  prophets.  In  the  glowing  pe- 
riods of  these  prophets  we  have  unmistakable  evidence  of 
the  deep  religiousness  that  suffused  the  minds  of  those 
who  from  the  first  guided  the  religious  life  of  the  nation. 
But  all  that  side  of  the  early  religious  history — and  how 
much  is  that  all ! — might  almost  as  well  never  have 
existed,  for  all  that  the  modern  historians  make  of  it.  The 
deep  spirituality  of  Hosea,  who  stands,  like  the  Saviour 
of  mankind  weeping  over  Jerusalem,  full  of  the  very 
love  of  God;  the  strong  ethical  tone  of  Amos  and  his 
enthusiasm  for  God;  the  lofty  aspirations  of  Isaiah  for 
righteousness,  and  his  rapt  visions  of  future  glory, — these 
surely  are  not  isolated  phenomena  in  the  centuries  that 
rolled  over  Israel  when  all  that  is  best  in  the  history  was 
being  achieved,  but  indicate  a  strong  under  -  current  of 
perennial  religious  life.  Yet  for  all  these,  even  taken  in 
their  isolation,  how  little  sympathy  do  our  modern  critical 
historians  exhibit !  Whereas  ]gwald^in  a  past  generation, 
came  to  the  Old  Testament  books  with  a  sympathetic 
spirit,  and  pftlitzscL.  in  our  own  generation,  with  a  piety 
pardonable  in  the  circumstances,  heard  in  these  prophetic 
voices  the  echo,  thrown  backward  over  the  centuries,  of  the 
Gospel  of  Christ,  we  get  nowadays  some  dry  analysis  of 
the  "  idea  "  and  the  "  conception  "  of  each  prophet,  and  a 
grudging  doling  out  of  the  attributes  of  might  and  holiness 
in  the  character  of  God,  and  reluctant  admissions  of  nascent 


0»  TIV 


476  Conclusion. 

monotheism  here  and  there,  but  we  catch  no  fire  from  the 
prophetic  words  as  they  are  weighed  and  measured  out  in 
t  he  scales  of  tlie  critics.^  Thesejmen,  _whose  words  are  the 
fittest  found  even  yet  to  express  all  that  we  can  think 
loftiest  of  God,  are  represented  as  groping  after  the  idea 
of  one  God,  contending  for  the  honour  of  a  deity  that  is 
little  better  than  a  Chemosh  or  a  Moloch ;  and  when  they 
cease  to  write  and  become  men  of  action,  they  are  set 
before  us  as  moved  by  paltry  motives  of  expediency, 
upholding  the  dignity  of  their  order  against  the  priest- 
hood, or  conspiring  with  them  to  bring  about  a  masterly 
movement  for  the  concentration  of  religious  worship 
directly  under  their  own  supervision.  Feasts,  sacrifices, 
incomes  of  the  clergy,  in  such  things,  and  in  the  central- 
isation of  tlie  worship  at  Jerusalem,  the  history  of  re- 
ligion is  made  to  consist ;  ^  but  the  heart  of  the  religion 
is  hardly  looked  at,  or  rudely  torn  out  of  it. 

So  that,  when  all  is  said  and  done,  the  impression  on 
the  mind  of  an  unprejudiced  reader  certainly  is  that  there 
is  more  in  the  religion  of  Israel  tl>an  the  modern  his- 
torians are  able  to  see  or  willing  to  acknowledge.  Let 
their  literary  analysis  be  ever  so  thorough,  one  who  will 
read  the  Old  Testament  books  as  he  would  read  any  other 
ancient  documents,  must  remain  convinced  that  justice  is 
not  done  to  them  by  a  criticism  which  ignores  their  most 

1  Wellhausen  must  needs  even  belittle   the   impression   of  sublimity- 
produced  by  the  account  of  the  Creation  m  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis. 
He  is  generous  enough  to  admit  that  "  the  beginning  especially  is  incom- 
parable."    But  "  chaos  being  given,  all  the  rest  is  spun  out  of  it :  all  that 
follows  is  reflection,  systematic  construction  ;   we  can  easily  follow  the 
calculation  from  point  to  point"  (Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  298).     He  could  have  ' 
done  it  himself  in  short.     Instead  of  the  artless  gestures  of  a  child  we  , 
have  the  stiff  movements  of  a  Dutch  doll.     But  is  it  the  Hebrew  writer  j 
or  the  modern  critic  that  is  wooden-headed  ? 

2  See  Wellhausen,  pp.  13,  27. 


Literary  Analysis.  477 

characteristic  element.  The  critics  object  to  the  Biblical 
theory  that  it  relies  so  much  on  the  supernatural:  the 
characteristic  feature  of  their  own  is  the  unnatural.  The 
Biblical  theory  says  there  was  a  course  of  history  quite 
unprecedented,  or  certainly  most  extraordinary;  the 
modern  theory  says  that  the  history  was  nothing  re- 
markable, but  there  was  quite  an  unprecedented  mode 
of  imagining  and  writing  it.  There  have  to  be  postu-\ 
lated  miracles  of  a  literary  and  psychological  kind,  which 
contradict  sound  reason  and  experience  as  much  as  any 
of  the  physical  miracles  of  the  Old  Testament  transcend, 
them. 

Even  in  what  is  its  strong  point,  literary  analysis,  I 
do  not  know  that  the  modern  theory  is  very  formidable 
if  the  underlying  historical  postulates  are  not  granted. 
Let  us  suppose  for  a  moment  that  it  is  possible  on  purely 
literary  grounds  to  separate  different  portions  of  the  Pen- 
tateuch books,  and  pronounce  them  to  be  from  different 
hands.  It  is  still  confessed  ^  that  the  relative  positions 
and  dates  of  these  portions  cannot  be  determined  from 
themselves.  Only  when  the  theory  of  the  historical 
development  is  introduced  do  the  original  sources  or 
diverse  components  fall  into  the  places  assigned  to  them 
in  the  scheme.  But  if  the  theory  of  the  development 
can  be  shown  to  be  so  far  untenable  that  what  is  pro- 
nounced by  it  late  may  well  have  been  much  earlier, 
then  the  arrangement  and  dating  of  the  parts  are  open  to 
revision.  As  to  the  critical  process  of  separating  the 
sources  as  literary  products,  I  regard  it  as  a  matter  of 
secondary  importance,  so  long  as  we  are  able,  by  the  help 
of  the  prophetic  writers,  to  determine  in  a  general  way 
that  the  books  in  their  combined  form  are  trustworthy 

1  Wellhausen,  History,  p.  10. 


478  Conclusion. 

documents,  and  that  the  views  they  set  forth  are  not 
unhistorical.  It  may  be  open  to  question,  however, 
whether  the  separation  has  not  been  carried  too  far,  and 
in  a  manner  somewhat  arbitrary  and  artificial.  When  we 
find  a  real  character  in  flesh  and  blood  in  Hebrew  history, 
we  find  him  capable  of  entertaining  more  than  one  idea 
in  his  mind,  and  even  sustaining  apparently  incompatible 
relations,  as  Samuel,  who  offered  sacrifice,  and  yet  seems 
to  scout  it  as  useless.  I  think  it  is  most  probable  that 
the  men  who  wrote  the  component  parts  of  these  books 
were  representative  and  public  men,  not  mere  "  priests " 
here  or  "prophetic  men"  there.  I  do  not  know,  in- 
deed, that  the  main  "  sources "  of  the  Hexateuch  differ 
more  in  style  or  substance  among  themselves  than  do  the 
synoptic  Gospels.  And  most  certainly  there  is  an  over- 
driving of  critical  processes  in  the  historical  books  when 
narratives  are  cut  up  into  contradictory  parts,  because 
some  character  in  the  story  is  represented  as  actuated 
by  different  motives  at  different  times,  or  playing  parts 
which  either  are  or  seem  to  be  inconsistent. 

But  let  it  be  granted  that  the  "  sources  "  of  the  Penta- 
teuch books  have  been  pretty  accurately  determined,  or 
let  the  very  highest  value  be  given  to  the  results  of 
critical  analysis,  there  is  one  remark  that  occurs  in  re- 
gard to  them.  We  have  seen  good  reason  for  believing 
that  the  art  of  literary  composition  does  not  begin  about 
the  time  of  the  first  writing  prophets,  but  was  then  well 
advanced.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  existence  of  these 
"  sources  "  of  the  critics  proves  the  same  thing  and  proves 
more.  Tliere  they  are,  combined,  at  a  very  early  period 
of  literary  composition — J  and  E  at  least — so  inextri- 
cably that  they  cannot  be  separated,  to  say  nothing  of 
the  redaction,  whether  by  the  Deuteronomist  or  another. 


Literary  Copyright,  479 

Now  we  are  continually  being  told  that  in  ancient 
times  there  was  no  literary  copyright,  and  that  the  pos- 
sessor of  a  book  considered  himself  entitled  to  treat  it 
as  his  own,  by  adding  to  it  or  incorporating  his  own 
materials  with  it;  and  that  in  this  way  we  might  get 
such  combinations  as  these  books  exhibit.  It  is  said 
also  that  the  earliest  writings  must  have  been  of  a 
private  or  personal  character  —  i.e.,  not  stamped  with 
such  authority  as  canonical  writings  came  to  possess. 
Now,  when  we  look  at  the  component  parts  of  the  Old 
Testament  writings,  as  the  analysis  of  criticism  exhibits 
them,  there  is  nothing  that  strikes  us  more  forcibly  than 
the  care  that  was  evidently  bestowed  in  preserving  even 
minute  parts  of  separate  documents.  It  may  be,  as  is 
generally  supposed,  that  when,  e.g.,  J  and  E  had  a  passage 
in  common,  the  redactor  who  combined  them  adopted  the 
one  and  excluded  the  other ;  but  the  obstinate  way  in 
which  minute  fragments,  even  single  words,  of  the  one 
intrude  into  the  other,  where  presumably  there  was  some 
slight  divergence  or  additional  detail,  and  this  in  the  case 
of  all  the  sources  or  redactions,  leads  us  to  the  conclusion 
that  even  at  that  early  time  when  these  sources  were 
combined,  there  was  a  regard  for  literary  copyright.^ 
Whether  this  is  consistent  with  the  idea  that  these 
sources  were  private  documents  is  not  very  certain. 
One  would  think  that  the  writing  of  the  history  of  the 
nation  on  the  broad  scheme  (comparatively)  on  which 
these  writers  proceed,  was  not  left  to  private  and  irre- 
sponsible men — at  least  was  not  undertaken  by  any  or 

1  Horton,  in  speaking  of  one  so  late  as  the  author  of  the  books  of 
Chronicles,  says,  when  he  had  different  authorities  before  him,  he  "  pre- 
ferred leaving  them  unharmonised  to  tampering  in  any  way  with  the 
facts." — Inspiration  and  the  Bible,  third  edition,  p.  160. 


480  Conclusion. 

every  one  who  cared  to  do  it.  We  should  most  natu- 
rally look  for  the  authors  of  such  writings,  when  great 
writers  were  rare,  among  outstanding  and  responsible 
men.  This  whole  aspect  of  the  matter  would  almost 
lead  to  the  conclusion  that  the  germ  of  a  canon  existed 
much  earlier  than  is  generally  asserted.  Especially  if, 
for  J.  and  E.  and  the  like,  we  substitute  the  names  of 
prophets  or  theocratic  men,  who  guided  the  nation's  re- 
ligious life  and  interpreted  its  history,  it  will  not  be 
so  evident  that  our  earlier  Scriptures  were  left  to  the 
haphazard  emendation  of  every  private  hand  into  which 
they  came. 

But  now,  if  the  knowledge  of  God  in  a  pure  form  is  to 
be  placed  so  far  back  in  history,  and  made  to  start  with 
a  simple  revelation  to  Abraham,  what  becomes  of  de- 
velopment ?  Well,  in  the  first  place,  the  modern  theory 
also  has  to  postulate  a  starting-point ;  and,  we  have  seen, 
its  difficulty  is  marked  when  it  seeks  to  place  the  absolute 
commencement  of  a  spiritual  religion  at  a  late  period. 
But,  in  the  second  place,  the  Biblical  theory  is  more  con- 
spicuously a  theory  of  development  than  the  modern  one. 
It  makes  the  advance  of  the  religious  idea  really  an  un- 
folding of  a  germinal  conception,  not  an  advance  from  one 
attribute  to  another,  as  from  might  to  holiness,  but  an 
expansion  of  one  fundamental  conception  into  wider  refer- 
ences and  application.  And  it  is  a  development  marked 
by  historical  stadia.  From  the  Being  who  made  Himself 
known  to  the  soul  of  Abraham,  and  from  that  time 
onward  was  the  covenant  God  of  one  nation,  faithful  to 
Ilis  word,  even  though  His  people  should  be  unfaithful 
on  their  part,  we  can  trace  an  unbroken  development  to 
the  God  of  all  the  families  of  mankind.  For  if  He  de- 
fends His  own  people  from  their  enemies,  and  is  at  tlie 


Biblical  View  of  Development.  481 

same  time  a  merciful  God  to  His  own,  the  idea  follows, 
and  we  see  it  early,  that  His  enemies,  by  submitting  to 
Him  and  casting  in  their  lot  with  His  people,  will  share 
in  His  people's  blessings,  and  thus  the  God  of  Israel 
will  become,  in  fact  as  well  as  of  right,  the  God  of 
all.  Strictly  speaking,  the  Old  Testament  writers  never 
got  beyond  the  idea  of  national  religion.  Though  they 
perceived  that  Jahaveh  ruled  all  nations,  and  acted  on 
strictly  moral  and  just  principles  towards  all,  they  never 
conceived  that  there  was  no  difference  between  His  rela- 
tion to  Israel  and  His  relation  to  the  nations.  In  point 
of  fact  there  was  a  difference,  as  history  has  proved. 
Even  in  New  Testament  times,  we  see  how  hard  it  was 
for  the  apostle  Peter  to  perceive  that  God  was  "no  re- 
specter of  persons,  but  that  in  every  nation  he  that 
feareth  Him  and  worketh  righteousness  is  accepted  with 
Him"  (Acts  X.  34,  35).  St  Paul  also  had  to  fight  hard 
for  the  position  that  "circumcision  is  nothing,  and  un- 
circumcision  is  nothing,  but  the  keeping  of  the  command- 
ments of  God"  (1  Cor.  vii.  19),  and  to  the  last  had  to 
contend  for  the  truth  that  the  God  whom  he  preached 
was  not  the  God  of  the  Jews  only,  but  also  of  the  Gentiles. 
The  highest  that  the  Old  Testament  prophets  attained  to 
was  an  anticipation  of  a  condition  of  things  under  which, 
through  Israel,  blessing  would  come  to  the  whole  world ; 
it  was  again  an  expansion  of  this  when,  in  the  New 
Testament,  the  middle  wall  of  partition  was  broken  down, 
and  all  who  have  the  faith  of  Abraham,  whether  they  be 
his  seed  or  not,  shall  share  in  his  blessing.  The  develop- 
ment here  is  unbroken ;  and  though  the  history  shows,  as 
all  history  does,  action  and  reaction,  yet  there  is  an  on- 
ward advance  from  beginning  to  end. 

Thus  from  Abraham  on  to  the  close  of  national  inde- 

2  H 


482  Conchmon. 

pendence  there  was  a  regular  and  steady  development, 
the  idea  of  Jahaveh  and  the  conception  of  what  His  re- 
ligion implied  undergoing  a  steady  expansion  in  the  pro- 
phetic teaching,  aided  by  the  political  events  through 
which  the  nation  passed.  The  revival  of  the  time  of  Ezra 
was  a  new  starting-point,  or,  as  we  may  better  express  it, 
the  course  of  development  had  come  round  by  a  wide 
cycle  to  a  new  starting-point ;  for  all  historical  movement 
is  of  this  kind,  in  cycles  which  come  back  again  upon 
themselves  and  follow  apparently  the  same  path,  though 
on  a  higher  plane.  What  happened  in  Ezra's  time  was 
this:  An  attempt  was  made,  on  the  basis  of  the  expe- 
rience of  the  past,  to  live  the  national  life  over  again 
under  new  conditions.  What  had  been  already  achieved 
was  gathered  up ;  the  national  life,  instead  of  having 
primarily  a  promise  of  a  future,  fed  itself  on  the  re- 
collections of  the  past ;  it  closed  around  the  results  of 
the  former  prophetic  activity,  and  sought  to  conserve 
what  had  been  attained,  as  the  starting-point  for  a  new 
round  of  experience.  There  is  in  the  plant  a  similar 
cycle  of  life :  the  flower  blossoms  and  then  decays ;  but 
before  it  has  fallen,  it  has  developed  the  seed  which  is 
to  be  the  life  of  a  coming  season ;  and  though  we  may 
think  that  the  plant  has  completed  its  period  of  life, 
this  is  not  so  if  it  has  matured  the  seed  which  has 
vitality  in  itself  for  future  growth.  The  hard  and  dry 
seed-pod  is  not  so  attractive  an  object  as  the  fair  blossom- 
ing flower,  but  it  not  only  is  the  result  of  the  past,  but 
has  also  promise  for  the  future.  And  if,  to  preserve  the 
figure,  the  period  of  the  Talmud  exhibits  men  amusing 
themselves  at  play  with  dry  peas,  yet  these  seeds  were 
not  dead,  and  many  even  in  the  Talmudic  period  recog- 
nised their  vitality.    And  when,  finally,  the  fulness  of  the 


Rudimentary  Ideas  of  Primitive  Peoples.  483 

time  was  come,  the  seeds  which  had  fallen  on  dry  ground 
shot  forth  with  new  and  more  beautiful  life :  the  truths 
reached  by  men  of  old  time,  which  had  been  treated  as 
so  many  dogmas  or  formulae,  were  seen  to  be  truths  en- 
dowed with  perennial  life.  The  teaching  of  the  prophets, 
and  the  fond  beliefs  of  the  people,  that  Jahaveh  would 
ever  be  Israel's  God,  were  illustrated  in  a  new  and  strik- 
ing manner  in  Him  who  was  raised  up  an  horn  of  salva- 
tion in  the  house  of  David,  and  the  anticipations  of  the 
time  when  Gentiles  should  come  to  the  light  of  Israel, 
were  fulfilled  when  the  wall  of  partition  was  broken 
down,  and  it  was  shown,  in  the  light  of  the  Gospel,  that 
Abraham  was  father  of  all  that  believe,  whether  they  be 
Jews  or  Gentiles. 

But  M.  Renan  objects :  This  makes  the  religion  of 
Israel  a  thing  that  has  no  beginning — a  thing  as  old  as 
the  world — a  supposition  which,  from  his  point  of  view, 
is  not  for  a  moment  to  be  entertained.  And  from  him 
and  from  others  we  hear  the  reiterated  appeal  to  "  primi- 
tive peoples,"  "  rudimentary  ideas,"  and  so  forth,  with  the 
implication  that  the  progress  of  Israel's  religious  life  must 
be  made  to  square  with  the  progress  found  in  other  na- 
tions. To  all  which  our  simple  reply  is — In  point  of  fact 
it  was  not  the  same ;  the  modern  theorists  themselves  are 
bound  to  admit  as  much  within  the  sphere  of  which  they 
say  we  have  authentic  information.  And  there  is  the 
other  fact,  patent  in  history,  that  other  primitive  peoples, 
and  even  peoples  of  the  same  Semitic  race,  never  got  to 
the  stage,  or  anything  approaching  the  stage,  that  the 
Hebrews  reached.  In  view  of  these  plain  facts  in  the 
world's  history,  it  is  simply  trifling  to  insist  upon  making 
Israel's  history  square  with  that  of  all  other  peoples.  The 
Oriental  of  the  present  day  has  a  very  expressive  answer 


484  Conclusion. 

to  all  such  arguments.  He  simply  extends  liis  hand,  and 
says,  "  See ;  are  the  fingers  of  the  hand  all  of  one  length  ? " 
In  the  matter  of  religion  we  are  not  to  be  guided  by  the 
degree  of  "  culture "  to  which  a  nation  has  attained,  or 
justified  in  speaking  of  early  and  late  at  all.  The  Egyp- 
tians and  Assyrians  were  far  in  advance  of  the  Israel- 
ites in  civilisation  and  outward  culture,  but  they  are  not 
to  be  compared  with  them  in  the  sphere  of  religion. 
Eenan  himself  has  pointed  out  how  the  simple  nomad  is 
far  in  advance  of  the  settled  inhabitant  of  the  city  in 
religious  experience.  The  history  of  the  world  would 
seem  in  a  striking  manner  to  confirm  the  Biblical  state- 
ments that  man  cannot  by  searching  find  out  God;  that 
the  world  by  wisdom  knew  not  God.  While  the  most 
acute  philosophers  and  thinkers  of  Greece  were  reasoning 
about  these  things,  the  simple-minded  Hebrews  had  reached 
a  firm  position  from  which  they  never  receded,  and  from 
which  the  whole  thinking  world,  as  from  a  starting-point, 
has  had  to  advance.^  It  is  all  very  well  for  us  now — 
when  the  light  shines — to  formulate  our  arguments  for  the 
existence  and  character  of  God;  for  we  know  what  we 
want  to  prove.  But  the  fact  that  reasoners  by  reason 
did  not  succeed  in  proving  it  till  the  Hebrew  race  had 
made  it  known  to  the  world,  and  the  other  fact  that  they 
did  not  reach  it  by  a  process  of  reasoning  or  reflection,  or 
adding  on  of  one  attribute  to  another — these  facts  show 
that  such  a  knowledge  is  given  with  more  direct  force, 
and  in  a  more  complete  form.  What  seems,  in  fact,  hard 
and  laborious  to  us  with  our  logical  categories  and  sub- 
jective processes,  seems  to  have  come  instinctively  to  the 
Abrahamic  race ;  and  even  Stade  has  admitted  that  if 
there  was  not  precisely  an  instinct  of  monotheism  in  the 

^  Bredenkatnp,  Gesetz  u.  Propheten,  p.  13. 


Newmans  Uxperience.  485 

Hebrews,  they,  above  all  others,  showed  a  predisposition 
to  it. 

In  this  connection  it  is  interesting  to  recall  an  incident 
mentioned  by  F.  W.  Newman,^  from  his  own  experience  as 
a  missionary.  "  While  we  were  at  Aleppo,"  he  says,  "  I 
one  day  got  into  religious  discourse  with  a  Mohammedan 
carpenter,  which  left  on  me  a  lasting  impression.  Among 
other  matters,  I  was  peculiarly  desirous  of  disabusing  him 
of  the  current  notion  of  his  people,  that  our  Gospels  are 
spurious  narratives  of  late  date.  I  found  great  difficulty 
of  expression ;  but  the  man  listened  to  me  with  great  at- 
tention, and  I  was  encouraged  to  exert  myself.  He  waited 
patiently  till  I  had  done,  and  then  spoke  to  the  following 
effect :  '  I  tell  you,  sir,  how  the  case  stands.  God  has 
given  to  you  English  a  great  many  good  gifts.  You  make 
fine  ships,  and  sharp  penknives,  and  good  cloth  and  cottons  ; 
and  you  have  rich  nobles  and  brave  soldiers;  and  you 
write  and  print  many  learned  books  (dictionaries  and 
grammars):  all  this  is  of  God.  But  there  is  one  thing 
that  God  has  withheld  from  you  and  has  revealed  to  us ; 
and  that  is,  the  knowledge  of  the  true  religion,  by  which 
one  may  be  saved.'  "  Newman  adds  :  "  When  he  had  thus 
ignored  my  argument  (which  was  probably  quite  unintelli- 
gible to  him)  and  delivered  his  simple  protest,  I  was  silent 
and  at  the  same  time  amused.  But  the  more  I  thought  it 
over,  the  more  instruction  I  saw  in  the  case."  For  my  own 
part,  I  have  much  sympathy  with  the  opinion  expressed 
by  the  Moslem  carpenter.  He  is  a  type  of  many  that  are 
to  be  found  in  the  humbler  ranks  of  society  in  the  East 
at  the  present  day,  who  are  little  qualified  to  follow  a  con- 
nected argument,  but  to  whom  religious  conceptions  of  a  V 
high  order  come  as  a  matter  of  course.     Such  men,  doubt- 

1  Phases  of  Faith,  second  edition,  1853,  p.  32  f. 


486  Conclusion, 

less,  were  those  who  wrote  and  who  read  many  of  the 
books  of  the  Old  Testament ;  and  hence  the  books  them- 
selves, though  subjected  to  the  most  harassing  criticism, 
and  characterised  as  "  spurious  narratives  of  late  date," 
smile  at  all  such  criticism,  and  give  forth  with  confidence 
their  testimony  to  a  faith,  which  is  independent  of  time, 
and  indifferent  to  modes  of  literary  composition. 

Our  investigations  have  been  confined  to  the  history 
of  Israel  as  a  nation,  and  the  conclusion  I  have  come  to  is 
that  the  history,  as  told  by  the  Bible  historians,  is  credible 
in  all  the  essential  points  at  which  we  have  the  means  of 
testing  it.  The  Biblical  view  carries  back  the  national 
life  and  the  national  religion  to  Abraham,  and  so  far  as 
we  are  able  to  check  the  accounts,  we  have  found  that 
without  this  assumption  the  history  cannot  be  explained. 
In  other  words,  from  the  12th  chapter  of  Genesis  onwards, 
we  conclude  that  we  have  a  credible  and  trustworthy  ac- 
count of  the  leading  events  and  crises  of  the  history  of 
Israel.  As  to  the  antecedent  eleven  chapters  of  Genesis, 
the  matters  therein  treated  do  not  fall  properly  within 
the  scope  of  our  present  inquiry.  They  do  not  constitute 
part  of  the  history  of  Israel,  strictly  speaking,  though  in 
the  Biblical  writings  they  are  made  to  lead  up  to  it  and 
give  a  basis  for  it.  These  accounts  of  primitive  and 
primeval  times,  if  we  place  them,  simply  as  ancient  docu- 
ments, side  by  side  with  the  early  traditions  and  cos- 
mogonies of  other  nations,  are,  as  has  been  univer- 
sally admitted,  characterised  by  a  sobriety,  purity,  and 
loftiness  of  conception  which  render  them  altogether 
unique.  If  we  should  set  them  down  as  merely  the 
attempts  on  the  part  of  the  Hebrew  writers  to  give  an 
account  of  origins  of  which  no  historical  record  was  in 
their  hands,  merely  the  consolidated  form  of  legends  and 


Traditions  of  Earliest  Times.  487 

myths  handed  on  from  prehistoric  times,  we  cannot  but 
recognise  the  singular  line  that  myth-making  took  in  this 
particular  case,  as  distinguished  from  the  cases  of  poly- 
theistic Semitic  and  non- Semitic  races.  Such  myths,  if 
they  are  to  be  so  described,  are  not  born  in  a  day ;  even 
if  the  writer  of  the  earliest  of  them  is  set  down  as  late  as 
the  eiglith  or  ninth  century  before  Christ,  the  folk-lore, 
if  you  will,  of  his  people  was  of  quite  a  unique  character 
before  it  could  furnish  such  materials ;  and  the  writer  of 
them  must  already  have  formulated  to  himself,  to  say  the 
least,  a  very  definite  philosophy  of  history,  and  had  a 
much  broader  conception  of  the  world  and  of  its  relation 
to  God,  than  we  should  expect  from  one  in  the  primitive 
stage  of  religion.  As  compared  with  the  earliest  formu- 
lated accounts  of  creation  and  primeval  times  contained 
in  Assyrian  literature,  they  are  pervaded  by  an  entirely 
different  spirit,  emancipated  from  bonds  of  polytheistic 
notions,  and  moving  altogether  on  a  higher  plane.  If  we 
find,  as  have  been  found,  correspondences  of  a  remarkable 
kind  in  the  Hebrew  and  other  early  accounts  of  the 
creation,  and  so  forth,  we  must  not,  as  has  too  often 
been  the  practice,  jump  to  the  conclusion  that  everything 
which  Hebrew  literature  and  tradition  have  in  common 
with  those  of  other  nations  must  be  borrowed  by  the 
Hebrews.  Why  should  the  Hebrews  borrow  from  every 
side,  and  yet  retain  something  so  clearly  distinguishing 
them  from  each  and  all  of  the  others  ?  Why  should  we 
not  admit  a  common  primeval  tradition,  when  it  is  thus 
attested  by  independent  witnesses  ?  Nay,  seeing  that 
the  Hebrew  tradition,  at  the  very  earliest  point  at  which 
we  can  seize  it,  is  purer  and  loftier  than  any  other,  why 
should  it  be  at  all  incredible  tliat  in  that  race,  from  pre- 
Abrahamic  times  and  in  the  lands  from  which  the  faith 


488  CoTwUision. 

of  Abraham  was  disseminated,  there  were  found  purer 
conceptions  of  God  and  deeper  intuitions  into  His  char- 
acter and  operations  than  we  find  elsewhere — glimmerings 
of  a  purer  faith  which  had  elsewhere  become  obscured  by 
polytheistic  notions  and  practices  ?  Do  not  the  results  of 
the  study  of  comparative  religion  tend  to  show  that  even 
polytheism  is  an  aberration  from  a  simpler  conception, 
and  that  the  lowest  forms  of  nature-religion  point  to  a 
belief  in  a  Being  whose  character  always  transcends  the 
forms  in  which  the  untutored  mind  tries  to  represent 
Him,  and  is  not  summed  up  in  all  their  attempts  to 
give  it  expression  ?  That  being  so,  why  should  it  be  a 
thing  incredible  that  in  one  quarter,  a  quarter  which  in 
the  clear  light  of  history  is  found  to  stand  sharply  de- 
fined from  its  surroundings,  the  souls  of  the  best  should 
have  kept  themselves  above  these  degradations,  and 
nursed  within  themselves  the  higher,  purer,  more  primary 
conception ;  and  that  this  should  have  taken  shape  in 
the  faith  of  Abraham,  or,  if  we  state  it  otherwise,  formed 
the  basis  on  which  the  purer  faith  of  Abraham  was 
reared  ?  This  will  not  seem  incredible  to  any  who  believe 
that  there  is  but  one  God,  and  that  He  has  been  the  same 
from  the  beginning.  It  is  only  a  statement  in  another 
form  of  St  Paul's  words,  that  God  has  never  left  Himself 
without  witness ;  and  it  is  quite  in  keeping,  I  believe,  with 
the  best  results  of  the  comparative  study  of  religions. 

In  the  foregoing  chapters,  I  have  carefully  abstained 
from  making  any  appeal  to  the  authority  of  New  Testa- 
ment Scriptures.  The  first  and  fundamental  question  is, 
not  whether  the  modern  theory  agrees  with  our  Christian 
religion  and  our  Confession,  but  whether  it  agrees  with 
sound  sense  and  sober  reason.  If  the  theory  is  to  be 
held  as  proved  on  these  solid  grounds,  our  views  must  be 


Ultimate  Issues  of  the  Controversy,  489 

adjusted  in  regard  to  it.  I  cannot  help  adding,  however, 
that  if  the  postulates  and  methods  of  this  kind  of  criticism 
are  to  be  admitted,  a  good  many  other  things  besides  our 
views  of  Old  Testament  history  will  require  to  be  re- 
adjusted. The  question  may  be  put  to  a  good  many  who 
seem  disposed  to  accept  the  modern  critical  treatment  of 
the  Old  Testament,  whether  they  are  prepared  to  allow  the 
same  processes  to  be  applied  to  the  New.  I  would  seri- 
ously ask  those  Christians  who  regard  Stade's  '  Geschichte  * 
as  a  successful  exhibition  of  the  religious  history  of  Israel, 
to  ponder  the  application  of  the  same  principles  of  criticism 
to  the  life  of  Jesus  Christ  in  the  second  volume  of  that 
work.  So  far  as  I  can  see,  the  arguments  used  in  the  one 
field  may  be  employed  equally  well  in  the  other,  and  the 
Gospel  history  be  critically  reconstructed  out  of  the  ten- 
dencies and  views  of  the  second  century,  just  as  the  ac- 
count of  the  pre-prophetic  religion  given  by  the  Hebrew 
writers  is  made  the  result  of  the  projection  backward  of 
later  ideas. 

Just  because  the  issues  in  this  controversy  are  so  far- 
reaching,  is  it  necessary  to  meet  the  critical  view  on  its 
own  ground,  anti  to  examine  the  foundation  on  which  it 
rests.  Questions  are  involved  that  lie  much  deeper  than 
those  of  the  verbal  inspiration  or  the  so-called  "inerr- 
ancy "  of  Scripture.  It  seems  to  me  vain  to  talk  of  the 
inspiration  and  authority  of  books  till  we  are  sure  that 
they  are  credible  and  honest  compositions,  giving  us  a 
firm  historical  basis  on  which  to  rest.  My  whole  argu- 
ment has  been  to  show  that,  examined  by  the  light  which 
they  themselves  furnish,  these  books  are  trustworthy  docu- 
ments ;  that  the  compositions  which  are  undoubted  and 
accepted  give  their  testimony  to  those  that  are  questioned 
or  rejected;  that  the  books  as  they  lie  before  us,  so  far 


490  Conclusion. 

as  they  can  be  tested  by  the  only  tests  in  our  possession, 
and  making  all  allowance  for  the  ordinary  conditions  of 
human  composition  and  transmission  of  books,  give  us  a 
fair  and  credible  account  of  what  took  place  in  the  his- 
tory and  religious  development  of  Israel.  If  that  point 
is  allowed  to  be  in  a  fair  way  established,  I  leave  the 
argument  for  inspiration  and  authority  to  take  care  of 
itself.  The  picture  which  the  books  present,  if  it  is 
admitted  to  be  in  any  sense  an  adequate  representation 
of  fact,  will  probably  be  sufficient  to  convince  ordinary 
Christian  people  that  in  ancient  Israel  there  was  a  divine 
control  of  events,  a  divine  guidance  of  the  best  spirits  of 
the  nation,  a  divine  plan  in  the  unfolding  of  the  history, 
which  we  may  sum  up  by  saying  there  was  a  divinely 
guided  development,  or,  as  it  has  been  expressed,^  that  the 
history  itself  is  inspired.  How  far  such  a  description,  in 
any  specific  sense,  may  be  given  of  the  history  as  it  is 
represented  by  the  theory  I  have  been  combating,  I  leave 
its  advocates  to  determine.  I  should  think,  however,  that 
that  is  the  very  minimum  of  any  theory  of  inspiration 
worthy  of  the  name.  I  should  think,  moreover,  that 
those  who  do  regard  the  history  of  Israel  as  divinely 
guided  and  inspired  in  a  sense  altogether  different  from 
other  ancient  history,  instead  of  underrating  as  a  vague 
or  negative  result  such  a  conclusion  as  it  has  been  my 
endeavour  to  establish  on  the  bare  ground  of  historical 
criticism,  ought  to  rejoice  if,  with  even  a  degree  of  prob- 
ability, it  can  be  made  out.  M.  Eenan  would  indeed  have 
us  believe  that  the  idea  which  animated  ancient  Israel, 
and  was  carried  over  into  Christianity,  is  played  out, 
having  received  its  death-blow  at  the  French  Eevolu- 
tion,  when  certain  thinkers  came  to  the  conclusion  that 

^  Horton,  Inspiration  and  the  Bible,  p.  171. 


The  New  Religion.  "  491 

there  was  no  Providence  controlling  the  events  of  man's 
world,  no  God  who  is  to  be  the  judge  of  man's  actions.^ 
Instead  of  hailing  with  pleasure  such  an  emancipation 
of  the  human  spirit,  we  ought  gladly  to  welcome  any 
help  that  comes  to  the  aid  of  faith  in  such  a  God  as 
the  patriarchs  and  prophets  are  represented  as  making 
known — a  God  whose  revelation  of  Himself  has  been 
advancing  with  brighter  radiance,  till  it  culminated  in 
the  manifestation  of  His  Son  Jesus  Christ,  who  was 
the  "  light  to  lighten  the  Gentiles,  and  the  glory  of  His 
people  Israel."  Such  a  faith  as  Old  Testament  prophets 
'possessed  has  been  the  blessing  and  the  guide  of  the  best 
of  mankind  in  their  achievement  of  the  best  up  till  this 
hour ;  such  a  faith  is  more  than  ever  needed  just  at 
I  the  present  moment,  to  save  the  human  race  from  losing 
respect  for  itself,  and  to  rekindle  hope  and  aspiration  for 
the  future.  The  choice  has  to  be  made,  in  the  last  resort, 
between  such  a  faith  and  "the  divine  pride  of  man  in 
himself,"  which,  we  are  told,  is  to  be  "  the  radical  foun- 
dation of  the  new  religion."  ^  And  even  the  volatile 
Frenchman  himself  has  said :  "  It  is  not  impossible  that, 
wearied  with  the  repeated  bankruptcies  of  liberalism,  the 
world  may  yet  again  become  Jewish  and  Christian."  ^ 

^  Souvenirs   d'Enfance  et  de  Jeunesse,  p.   337 ;    Histoire  du  Peuple 
d'Israel,  tome  i.  pp.  27,  40,  41. 

2  Walt  Whitman,  Democratic  Vistas  (Camelot  Series),  p.  6.5. 

3  Histoire  du  Peuple  d'Israel,  tome  i.  p.  vii. 


NOTES. 


Note  I.  p.  7.  —  English  readers  naturally  expect  that  scholars 
should  be  able,  by  mere  linguistic  features,  to  arrange  the  01c 
Testament  books  in  chronological  order  ;  and  find  it  difficult  to 
understand  how,  in  the  matters  of  language  and  style,  there  should 
be  so  little  appreciable  distinction  between  books  dating  centuries 
apart.  That  the  fact  is  so,  is  sufficiently  proved  by  the  various 
dates  assigned  by  diiferent  critical  scholars  to  the  same  compositions. 
What  used  to  be  regarded  as  the  earliest  of  the  (large)  components 
of  the  Pentateuch,  is  now  by  the  prevailing  school  made  the  latest, 
and  the  linguistic  features  have  not  been  considered  a  bar  to  either 
view  (see  p.  42).  The  uniformity  of  the  language  of  the  Old  Tes- 
tament is  partly  explained  by  the  fact  that  the  ancient  mode  of 
writing  only  the  consonants  did  not  provide  for  the  preservation 
of  those  variations  in  vowel-sounds  which  usually  mark  the  history 
of  languages  ;  and  when,  at  a  late  period,  a  system  of  vowel-points 
was  adopted,  a  uniformity  in  this  respect  would  be  the  result.  The 
English  reader  must  not,  however,  conclude  that  there  is  no  differ- 
ence observable  between  early  and  late  productions.  The  books  of 
Daniel,  Ezra,  and  Nehemiah  betray  their  later  date  by  the  presence 
of  the  so-called  Chaldee  portions  ;  and  the  book  of  Ecclesiastes,  as 
Delitzsch  has  said,  must  be  placed  late,  else  there  is  no  history  of 
the  Hebrew  language  at  all.  The  books  of  Chronicles  indicate  their 
lateness  even  by  the  matter.  Still,  in  the  great  mass  of  the  Hebrew 
literature  there  are  no  sure  linguistic  landmarks  denoting  definite 
literary  periods.     It  must  be  admitted  that  in  this,  as  in  other  re- 


494  Notes, 

spects,  the  East  is  more  stationary  than  the  West ;  and  it  is  there- 
fore somewhat  misleading  to  compare  long  periods  of  our  own  history 
with  the  same  number  of  years  in  Hebrew  history  (as  is  done,  e.g.^ 
by  Hoiton,  in  '  Inspiration  and  the  Bible,'  third  edition,  p.  143). 
A  modern  Arabic  author  will  write  in  the  style  of  an  ancient  classic, 
without  subjecting  himself  to  the  charge  of  pedantry  ;  and  the  uni- 
formity of  the  style  of  Assyrian  documents  is  remarkable.  When 
once  a  certain  style  for  a  certain  subject  is  fixed,  it  tends  to  stereo- 
type itself ;  and  one  author  may  be  master  of  more  than  one  style. 
At  all  events,  the  determination  of  separate  authorship  does  not,  as  a 
rule,  go  far  to  the  determination  of  date.     Cf.  below.  Note  XXVI. 

Note  II.  p.  21. — M.  Kenan's  estimate  of  the  historical  sciences,  to 
which  his  life  has  been  devoted,  is  not  very  high  :  "  Little  conjec- 
tural sciences,  which  are  unmade  as  fast  as  they  are  made,  and  which 
will  be  neglected  a  hundred  years  hence."  With  his  sneer  at  the 
"  ugly  little  Jew  "  (St  Paul)  who  was  unable  to  understand  the  god- 
dess whom  Eenan  on  the  Acropolis  addressed,  may  be  contrasted 
the  declaration  of  Heine  in  his  '  Confessions  '  :  "  Formerly  I  had  no 
special  admiration  for  Moses,  probably  because  the  spirit  of  Hellen- 
ism was  dominant  within  me,  and  I  could  not  pardon  in  the  law- 
giver of  the  Jews  his  intolerance  of  all  types  and  plastic  representa- 
tions. ...  I  see  now  that  the  Greeks  were  only  handsome  youths, 
while  the  Jews  were  always  men,  powerful,  indomitable  men."  See 
'  Wit,  Wisdom,  and  Pathos  from  the  Prose  of  Heinrich  Heine,'  by 
Snodgrass,  second  edition,  p.  256  f. 

Note  III.  p.  23.  —  Tiele  in  his  '  Kompendium  der  Religions- 
geschichte,'  §  3,  thus  lays  down  the  fundamental  lines  of  the  whole 
subject :  It  is  probable  for  various  reasons  that  'primitive  religion, 
which  has  left  but  few  traces,  was  followed  by  a  prevailing  period 
of  animism,  which  is  still  found  in  the  so-called  nature-religions 
(or,  as  he  prefers  to  call  them,  "  polydemonistic-magical  tribal  re- 
ligions"), and  which,  at  a  still  early  period  among  civilised  peoples, 
was  developed  into  loolytheistic  national  religions,  resting  on  tradi- 
tional teaching.  At  a  later  time  there  arose  out  of  polytheism,  here 
and  there,  nomistic  religions,  or  religious  communities  based  on  a 
law  or  sacred  writing.  In  these  polytheism  was  more  or  less  over- 
come by  pantheism  or  monotheism,,  in  the  last  of  which  are  found  the 
roots  of  the  world-religions.  All  this,  as  is  pointed  out  by  Tiele's 
French  translator  (Maurice  Vernes,  L'histoire  des  Religions,  p.  42),  is 


Notes.    -  495 

very  much  a  repetition  of  AngusteComte's  famous  trilogy,  fetishirimj 
polytheism,  monotheism  ;  with  this  difference,  that  Tiele  and  his 
followers  regard  monotheism  as  a  permanent  religion,  while  Comte 
and  his  school  regard  it  as  destined  to  give  place  to  positive  philo- 
sophy. It  is  plain,  moreover,  that,  starting  with  a  determination 
of  what  is  to  be  found,  the  inquirer  will  be  strongly  tempted  to  find 
it,  at  the  expense,  it  may  be,  of  sober  interpretation  of  facts. 

Note  IV.  pp.  28, 43. — Writers  of  the  critical  school  are  in  the  habit 
of  attacking  what  they  call  the  "  traditional  theory."  With  thip, 
however,  we  need  not  concern  ourselves,  except  in  so  far  as  it  is 
found  in  the  Biblical  writers.  The  0.  T.  writers  have  a  theory,  and  / 
it  is  enough  that  we  examine  it,  especially  as  the  advanced  critics/ 
tell  us  plainly  that  it  is  erroneous.  (See  Kuenen,  National  Re-S 
ligions,  p.  69  f.)  Whether  Robertson  Smith  gives  an  exact  state- 
ment of  the  traditional  theory  (0.  T.  in  Jewish  Church,  p.  208  ff.) 
I  am  not  prepared  to  say.  I  agree  with  him,  however,  that  the 
position  assigned  to  the  prophets,  in  the  theory  as  he  sketches  it,  is 
not  consistent  with  the  declarations  of  the  prophets  themselves  (p. 
216).  My  whole  contention  is,  that  the  Biblical  writers  do  not  bind 
us  to  any  theory  or  view  of  the  mode  of  composition  of  books,  what- 
ever may  have  been  "  traditionally  "  inferred  or  taken  for  granted  in 
the  matter ;  but  as  to  the  sequence  of  events,  and  the  religious  signi- 
ficance of  events,  their  language  is  plain  and  emphatic.  It  is  with 
that  language,  and  the  view  it  expresses,  not  with  traditional  inter- 
pretations of  it,  that  we  have  to  dt  al. 

Note  V.  p.  35. — Vatke,  from  whom  Wellhausen  "gratefully  ac- 
knowledges himself  to  have  learned  best  and  most"  (Hist,  of  Israel, 
p.  13),  says  that  Moses  must  be  measured  by  his  time,  and  that  it 
is  impossible  that  an  individual  should  rise  suddenly  from  a  lower 
to  a  higher  stage  and  raise  a  whole  people  with  him  ;  so,  though  an 
individual  may  out  of  weakness  fall  back  to  a  lower  level  (as  to  idol  ,,        ^ 
and  image  worship),  yet  this  is  impossible  in  the  case  of  a  whole  i<^-^  ^ 
,^e2plg,  if  the  consciousness  of  the  unity  of  God  was  actually  alive.  'T^^^^^j^  x 
As  to  the  age  of  Moses,  according  to  whose  standard  the  lawgiver  ^  <,    Oi 
is  to  be  measured,  Yatke  denied  to  it  even  the  knowledge  of  writing  ^vH'j^ 
(Bibl.  Theo].,  179-183).     Ewald,  on  the  other  hand,  speaking  of  the  yuJPt  <h 
time  of  Moses,  says  :  "  A  new  power  was  in  that  distant  age  set  in  ""lb   f^i 
motion  in  the  world,  whose  pulsations  vibrated  through  the  whole 
of  antiquity,"  &c.  (Hist,  of  Isnel,  Eng.  transL,  vol.  ii.  p.  169);  and 


496  Notes, 

F.  C.  Baur  says  that  Mosaism  must  ever  be  regarded  as  a  great 
religious  reform,  a  renewing  and  restoration  of  a  purer  religion, 
periodically  obscured  and  threatened  with  a  still  deeper  obscuration 
(in  Studien  und  Kritiken  for  1832). 

Note  VL  p.  44. — The  classical  passage  in  the  Talmud  (Baba 
Bathra,  14  b.)  contains  really  all  that  the  rabbins  had  of  tradition  on 
the  subject  of  the  authorship  of  the  Old  Testament  books ;  and  it 
is  so  obscurely  expressed  that  it  is  evident  the  tradition,  whatever 
it  was,  was  mixed  up  with  crude  guesses  of  their  own.  The  passage 
is  given  by  Strack  in  the  Herzog-Plitt  Encyklopadie,  vol.  vii., 
art.  "  Kanon  des  Alten  Testaments."  It  is  also  given  in  English, 
and  discussed  by  Briggs,  Bibl.  Study,  p.  175  ff. 

Note  VII.  p.  47. — During  the  Egyptian  war  of  1882  there  was  a 
newspaper  edited  by  an  intimate  associate  of  Arabi,  and  circulated 
widely  among  the  fellahtn  and  those  favourable  to  Arabi's  cause. 
It  gave  most  circumstantial  and  minute  details  of  his  operations  and 
glowing  accounts  of  his  victories.  The  readers  of  this  paper  be- 
lieved, for  example,  that  a  midshipman  who  lost  his  way  on  the 
sands  somewhere  near  Kefr  Dawar,  and  was  taken  prisoner,  was  the 
admiral  of  the  British  fleet ;  and  their  belief  was  encouraged  by  the 
attention  bestowed  on  the  prisoner,  and  the  state  in  which  he  was 
made  to  live  in  one  of  the  palaces.  They  also  believed  that  Arabi's 
troops  had  many  successful  engagements  with  the  British ;  and,  as 
a  native  writer  says,  had  the  sum  of  the  British  reported  as  killed 
been  added  up,  it  would  have  amounted  to  ten  times  their  whole 
actual  number  (Scottish  Keview,  April  1887,  p.  386).  A  copy  of 
this  paper,  dated  a  day  or  so  before  the  battle  of  Tel-ei-Kebir,  was 
picked  up  in  the  trenches  by  a  British  soldier,  and  used  as  letter- 
paper  to  write  to  his  friends  at  home.  1  had  the  good  fortune  to  see 
it,  and  I  found  it  full  of  the  most  extravagant  accounts  of  the  doings 
of  the  rebel  army  on  the  very  eve  of  its  discomfiture.  What  would 
a  future  historian  make  of  a  complete  file  of  this  paper  ? 

Note  VIII.  p.  53. — It  is  not  necessary  for  us  to  enter  into  critical 
questions  as  to  the  composition  and  the  original  "  sources "  oi 
the  various  books ;  but  a  brief  statement  of  the  chief  critical  con- 
clusions and  designations  is  here  desirable.  The  oldest  of  all  the 
historical  authorities  recognised  by  critics  are  those  songs,  or  poetical 
pieces,  which  presumably  had  their  rise  in  connection  with  stirring 


Kotes.  49? 

events,  and  were,  in  the  first  instance,  handed  down  orally.  The 
song  of  Deborah,  says  Stade,  bears  traces  of  having  been  composed 
under  the  immediate  impression  of  the  victory  it  celebrates,  and 
it  is  usually  appealed  to  as  one  of  the  oldest  sources  of  historical 
information.  The  Hexateuch  {i.e.,  the  six  books  Genesis  to  Joshua) 
Is  regarded  as  one  great  composite  work,  within  which  several  large 
component  parts  (to  say  nothing  of  redactional  matter)  of  different 
dates  are  distinguishable.  The  book  of  Deuteronomy  may  be  set 
aside  as  a  part  by  itself  with  well-marked  features.  There  remain 
two  larger  sources,  capable  again  of  minor  subdivision.  The  first 
of  these  in  historical  order  is  a  story-book,  now  usually  designated 
(after  Wellhausen)  J  E,  having  been  originally  two  books,  one  (J) 
characterised  by  the  use  of  the  name  Jahaveh,  the  other  (E)  by  the 
use  of  the  name  Elohim,  the  former  belonging  probably  to  the 
southern  kingdom,  the  latter  to  the  northern.  They  are  both  of 
prophetical  or  popular  character.  Wellhausen's  school  makes  J  the 
earlier,  placing  it  in  the  middle  of  the  ninth  century  B.C.,  while  E 
would  fall  not  later  than  750  B.C.  Both  of  these  may  have  incor- 
porated older  sources,  and  may  both  have  been  originally  of  larger 
compass  ;  they  are  now  so  closely  joined  together  that  a  separation 
of  them  in  their  original  entireness  may  be  considered  impossible. 
This  combined  source  J  E  is  often  designated  the  Jehovist,  to  dis- 
tinguish it  from  J,  the  simple  Jahvist.  The  other  great  component 
part  of  the  Hexateuch  used  to  be  called  the  Grundschrift  or  Funda- 
mental Writing,  because  it  was  regarded  as  the  earliest  main  source, 
a  sort  of  backbone  about  which  the  other  parts  were  grouped.  Its 
first  portion  is  the  opening  chapter  of  Genesis,  and  in  the  remainder 
of  that  book  those  portions  that  are  headed  "  these  are  the  genera- 
tions," &c.,  belong  to  it,  and  hence  Ewald  called  it  the  "  Book  of 
Origins."  It  was  also  called  the  "  Older  Elohist,"  to  distinguish  it 
from  the  Elohistic  story-book,  now  called  E.  The  main  portion  of 
it  lies  in  the  middle  books,  particularly  in  Leviticus,  and  from  this 
part,  which  is  its  most  striking  feature,  this  source  is  now  usually 
denoted  by  P. — i.  e.,- Priestly  source.  Wellhausen  thinks  that  the  ker- 
nel of  this  work  was,  what  he  designates  Q  {  =  quatuor,  four),  a  work 
containing  the  four  covenants  (Gen.  i.  28-30,  ix.  1-17,  xvii. ;  Exod. 
vi.  2,  ff.)  This  great  source  is  now  regarded,  not  as  the  underlying 
fundamental  document,  but,  so  to  speak,  the  final  encircling  frame- 
work, which  held  all  the  others  together  in  a  systematic  scheme, 
and  in  date  it  is  declared  to  be  exilic.  Some  critics  recognise  more, 
some   less,  pre-existing   material  within  its  own  proper  domain  ; 

2  I 


498  Notes. 

and  it  need  not  be  said,  the  views  as  to  tlie  processes  by  which  the 
whole  composite  Hexateuch  grew  to  its  present  form,  vary  con- 
siderably (see  chap.  vi.  p.  139  ff.)  As  to  the  other  historical  books, 
the  books  of  Kings  bear  on  their  face  that  they  were  composed  in 
the  time  of  the  exile  (whatever  earlier  materials  they  may  embody). 
In  1  Kings  vi.-viii.,  Wellhausen  recognises  marks  of  the  influence  of 
the  (still  later)  Priestly  Code  (Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  280).  The  book  of 
Judges,  besides  an  introduction  (i.  1-ii.  5)  and  an  appendix  (xvii.- 
xxi.),  is  made  up  of  a  number  of  stories,  recounting  the  exploits 
of  local  heroes.  These  stories,  however,  are  set  in  a  framework, 
said  to  be  from  a  different  hand,  explaining  in  stereotyped  phrase 
how  the  various  oppressions  came  about,  how  the  deliverer  was 
raised  up,  and  how  long  the  effects  of  the  deliverance  lasted.  The 
chapters  at  the  end  (xix.-xxi.)  Stade  calls  a  "tendency  romance," 
fully  in  accord  with  the  Priestly  source  (Gesch.,  i.  p.  71).  Well- 
hausen, however  (Hist.,  p.  237),  does  not  make  this  portion  so  late 
as  P.  C,  with  the  exception  of  one  reference  to  the  "  congregation," 
and  the  mention  of  Phinehas.  So  he  says  (Hist.,  p.  256)  that  1  Sam. 
vii.,  viii.,  x.  17  f.,  xii.,  betray  a  close  relationship  with  those  chapters 
of  the  book  of  Judges. 

Note  IX.  p.  77. — The  hieroglyphic  system  is  found  in  perfection 
on  the  monuments  of  the  18th  and  19th  dynasties — i.e.,  earlier  than 
the  exodus.  But  by  that  time  it  was  a  venerable  system  ;  for 
remains  of  monuments  from  even  the  4th  dynasty  exhibit  a 
character  essentially  identical  with  that  found  in  the  inscriptions  of 
Thothmes  and  Eameses.  Budge,  in  speaking  of  the  cover  of  the  sar- 
cophagus of  Menkau  Ra  (or  Mycerinus),  of  the  4th  dynasty  (dated 
by  Brugsch,  3633  B.C.),  says  :  There  is  little  difference  between  the 
shape  of  the  hieroglyphics  of  those  days  and  those  of  a  much  later 
date  ;  and  however  far  we  may  go  back,  we  never  come  to  an  in- 
scription belonging  to  a  period  in  which  we  can  see  that  the  Egyp- 
tians were  learning  to  write  (Dwellers  on  the  Nile,  p.  63).  In  1847 
was  published  by  Prisse  a  facsimile  of  a  papyrus  found  in  a  tomb  of 
the  11th  dynasty  {i.e.,  some  centuries  earlier  than  Moses).  Old  as 
it  is,  it  is  a  copy  of  an  original  work  composed  by  a  writer  of  the 
5th  dynasty  ;  and,  to  crown  all,  the  original  author,  who  is  an  old 
man,  laments  over  the  good  old  times  that  are  gone.  A  translation 
of  Pentaur's  poem  by  Professor  Lushington  is  contained  in  Records 
of  the  Past,  first  ser.,  vol.  ii.  p.  65  ff.  Comp.  Budge,  Dwellers  on 
the  Nile,  chap,  v.     It  is  interesting  to  note  that  it  exhibits  the 


Notes.  499 

system  of  parallelism  which  is  so  chaiucteristic  of  Hebrew  poetry, 
and  has  other  resemblances  to  the  lyrical  and  prophetical  style  of 
the  Old  Testament. 

Note  X.  p.  116. — How  very  early  the  Messianic  expectation  had 
taken  a  precise  form  may  be  gathered  from  the  way  Amos  speaks  of 
the  "day  of  Jahaveh"  (v.  18-20).  This  expression,  which  appears 
so  prominently  throughout  prophetic  literature,  was  evidently  by 
his  time  in  common  use  to  denote  "a  good  time  coming."  The 
polemic  of  the  propliet  implies  this,  as  it  also  teaches  the  funda- 
mental conception  of  the  "cycle"  of  history  to  which  reference  is 
made  above,  p.  117. 

Note  XI.  p.  124. — Robertson  Smith  says  :  *'  That  the  division  of 
Israel  into  twelve  tribes  did  not  assume  its  present  shape  till  after 
the  conquest  of  Canaan,  is  recognised  by  most  recent  inquirers " 
(Kinship  and  Marriage  in  Early  Arabia,  p.  219).  Stade  tells  us 
that  no  historical  recollection  goes  back  to  the  time  of  the  entrance 
of  the  Israelites  into  Western  Palestine  (Geschichte,  i.  p.  147)  ;  that 
there  were  never  twelve  tribes  at  one  and  the  same  time,  but  some- 
times more,  sometimes  fewer,  and  that  only  by  artificial  means  was 
the  number  twelve  made  out  (a  number  found  in  the  similar 
legends  of  other  peoples),  either  by  leaving  out  Levi,  or  by  making 
Ephraim  and  Manasseh  one.  The  system,  he  says,  is  due  to  the 
priests,  and  grew  up  at  the  sanctuaries  to  confirm  the  general  system 
of  patriarchal  legends  (p.  145).  We  may  conjecture,  he  says,  that  a 
system  once  prevailed,  according  to  which  the  tribes  were  repre- 
sented as  the  wives  of  Jacob,  for  the  names  Leah,  Each  el,  Zilpah, 
Bilhah,  are  to  be  taken  as  names  of  Hebrew  tribes.  Independent  of 
this  there  must  have  been  a  genealogy  representing  the  tribes  as 
sons^  as  is  apparent  from  the  fact  that  Leah  is  just  another  form  of 
Levi  ;  but  the  legendary  cycle  which  knew  the  tribe  of  Levi  in  the 
form  of  Leah,  wife  of  Jacob,  knew  nothing  of  the  legend  which  repre- 
sented it  as  Levi,  the  son  of  Jacob,  and  vice  versa  (p.  146).  Moreover, 
the  principle  of  genealogy  must  have  crossed  other  systems  of  divi- 
sion, particularly  the  geographical  system,  by  which  tribes  contiguous 
in  situation  were  represented  as  consanguineous.  Yet,  after  allowing 
himself  all  this  latitude  and  choice  of  explanations,  Stade  cannot, 
e,g,^  account  for  the  fact  that  Reuben,  an  insignificant  tribe,  was 
made  the  firstborn  (unless,  perhaps,  as  he  suggests,  it  was  just 
because  this  was  an  insignificant  tribe,  put  forth,  so  to  speak,  as  a 


500  ,  Notes. 

neutral-coloured  figure-head  to  allay  the  jealousies  of  the  two  great 
rival  tribes,  Judah  and  Ephraim),  Nor  can  he  explain  why  Zebulon 
and  Issachar  (northern  tribes)  are  grouped  with  Judah  under  Leah, 
and  Asher  (west)  with  Gad  (east)  under  Zilpah.  It  seems  also 
an  extraordinary  statement  to  make,  that  the  circles  which  knew  of 
Levi  and  Leah  as  the  son  and  wife  respectively  of  Jacob,  knew 
nothing  of  the  legendary  beliefs  of  one  another ;  for  one  would 
suppose  that  if  the  tribal  genealogies  were  preserved  anywhere,  it 
would  be  in  the  tribe  concerned  ;  and  yet  one  part  of  the  tribe,  on 
this  supposition,  would  not  know  what  the  other  part  thought  of 
themselves.  It  seems  to  me,  that  to  place  the  formation  of  all  this 
legendary  matter,  as  Stade  does,  in  the  time  of  the  divided  monarchy 
(p.  147),  is  not  justifi.able  in  the  face  of  the  song  of  Deborah,  nor 
consistent  with  his  own  position  stated  elsewhere  (p.  396),  that  the 
monarchical  system,  by  concentrating  power,  struck  at  the  religious 
system  on  which  tribal  formation  rests,  not  to  speak  of  the  opposi- 
tion of  the  Jahaveh  religion  to  the  same  ideas.  In  other  words,  the 
system  requires  longer  time  to  grow,  and  presupposes  a  much  more 
primitive  condition  of  society  than  his  assumption  implies.  Much 
more  may  this  be  said  of  the  explanation,  favoured  by  Robertson 
Smith,  of  the  tribal  system  by  the  belief  and  practice  of  totemism, 
on  the  ground  of  the  animal  names  of  some  of  the  tribes  (Kinship, 
&c.,  I.  c.)  The  last-named  writer  claims  to  have  pointed  out  that  the 
name  Sarah  or  Sarai  corresponds  as  closely  with  Israel  as  Leah 
does  with  Levi ;  and  argues  hence  that,  as  Abraham  was  originally  a 
Judsean  hero,  we  have  an  explanation  how  Sarah  (  =  Israel)  was 
Abraham's  sister  before  she  came  to  be  called  his  wife  and  the 
mother  of  Israel  and  Judah  alike  (ibid.,  Note  XI.  to  chap,  i.,  p.  257). 
The  great  difficulty  is  to  find  room  for  the  development  that  all  this 
implies  within  the  firm  historical  limits  prescribed  by  our  written 
documents.  The  personality  of  the  patriarchs,  as  tribal  heads,  is 
not  inconsistent  with  a  growth  of  tribes  by  accretion,  as  modern 
Arab  practice  shows.  The  Biblical  theory,  placing  a  long  period 
between  the  patriarchs  and  the  exodus,  allows  room  for  this ;  but 
Stade  does  not,  by  ascribing  the  tribal  formation  and  the  growth  of 
the  legends  to  the  times  succeeding  the  invasion  of  Canaan.  As  to 
a  tribe  not  knowing  its  father,  as  he  asserts,  see  an  article  by  Curtiss 
in  Expositor,  third  series,  vol.  vi.  p.  328  f.  Stade's  assertion  that 
no  historical  recollection  goes  back  to  the  time  of  the  entrance  into 
Canaan,  is  met  by  the  concurrent  testimony  of  all  the  sources,  and 


Notes.  601 

the  clear  voice  of  the  earliest  writing  prophets,  to  the  ellect  that 
Israel  came  out  of  Egypt. 

Note  XII,  p.  127. — Yet  the  only  passage  in  which  Abraham  appears 
as  a  warrior  (Gen.  xiv.,  in  which  the  rescue  of  Lot  is  described)  is 
relegated  by  Wellhausen  and  Kuenen  to  post-exilic  times,  and  de- 
clared to  be  quite  unhistorical.  The  chapter  is  a  veritable  crux  for 
modern  criticism  ;  it  will  not  allow  itself  to  be  classed  with  any  of 
the  main  sources,  and  so  Kautzsch  and  Socin  print  it  in  a  type  by  it- 
self (Die  Genesis,  mit  aussererUnterscheidung  der  Quellenschriften). 
Wellhausen  declares  that  it  may  be  described,  like  Melchizedec,  as 
"without  father,  without  mother,  without  genealogy."  Critics  of 
a  more  moderate  type  (as  Schrader,  Dillmann,  and  Kittel)  regard  it 
as  an  old  independent  piece  (perhaps  borrowed  from  a  native  Pales- 
tinian source)  taken  up  by  E.  To  which  Wellhausen  replies  that 
this  is  the  last  document  to  which  it  should  be  assigned,  since  in  E 
Abraham  is  represented  as  a  "  Muslim  "  and  a  prophet,  but  never  a 
warrior.  Neither,  says  he,  does  the  glorification  of  Jerusalem  (the 
southern  sanctuary)  suit  E,  a  northern  story-teller.  Most  probably, 
he  concludes,  the  final  redactor  who  united  J  E  with  Q,  took  up 
this  recital,  which  had  no  connection  with  the  antecedent  and  sub- 
sequent context  (Composition  des  Hexateuchs,  pp.  26,  310).  So 
Kuenen  calls  it  a  post-exilic  version  of  Abram's  life,  a  Midrash 
(Hexateuch,  sect.  16). 

Note  XIII.  p.  133. — H.  G.  Tomkins,  in  his  *  Studies  on  the  Times 
of  Abraham'  (Bagster,  1878),  has  brought  together  much  interesting 
matter,  drawn  from  recent  archaeological  research.  Reference  may 
be  made  also  to  Deane's  '  Abraham  ;  His  Life  and  Times,'  in  the 
"  Men  of  the  Bible "  Series.  It  is  time  that  an  extreme  criticism, 
which  will  persist  in  representing  Israel  as  groping  its  way  out  of 
the  most  primitive  ideas,  while  civilisation  prevailed  around  them, 
should  bend  to  the  force  of  facts  which  are  multiplying  every  day. 
What  has  been  done  in  the  field  of  Homeric  studies  should  not  be 
without  its  lesson  to  Biblical  students. 

Note  XIV.  p.  171. — Eobertson  Smith  (Religion  of  Semites,  first 
series,  p.  92  ff.)  has  an  ingenious  discussion  of  the  original  significa- 
tion of  haal,  in  which  he  relies  much  on  the  Arabic  expression 
(baal  land),  which  denotes  land  nourished  b}*  subterranean  waters. 


502  Notes. 

Whether  his  conclusion  be  right  or  not,  it  is  evident  that  a  good 
deal  must  have  happened  before  a  god  under  the  earth  beneath  be- 
came the  chief  god  in  the  heaven  above  ;  and  also  that  by  the  time 
we  reach  the  stage  of  conception  of  the  earliest  Hebrew  writing  (not 
to  say  language),  in  which  "  baal  means  the  master  of  a  house,  the 
owner  of  a  field,  cattle,  or  the  like,"  we  are  very  far  indeed  from  the 
original  Semitic  conception,  if,  indeed,  that  order  of  development 
took  place  at  all.  In  this  very  learned  work  there  are  too  many 
sudden  leaps  from  primitive  notions  of  Semitic  peoples  to  such  an  ad- 
vanced stage  of  thought  as  is  represented  by  the  prophets.  In  my 
opinion,  the  work  would  have  been  as  valuable  a  contribution  to  our 
knowledge  of  the  common  Semitic  religion,  and  much  less  confusing 
and  inconsequent,  had  the  author  not  proceeded  on  the  assumption 
that  the  theory  of  the  history  of  Israel  set  forth  by  Wellhausen  and 
Kuenen  is  established,  or,  as  he  states  the  matter,  that  the  researches 
of  writers  of  that  school  have  "  carried  this  inquiry  to  a  point  where 
nothing  of  vital  importance  for  the  historical  study  of  the  Old  Testa- 
ment religion  still  remains  uncertain"  (Pref.,  p.  vii.)  The  pre- 
cariousness  of  the  philological  argument,  so  much  employed  by  him, 
is  seen  in  the  fact  that  expressions  illustrating  what  are  claimed  as 
primitive  beliefs  are  found  as  frequently  in  undoubtedly  late  as  in 
early  writers.  In  the  Archaeological  Review  (vol.  iii..  No.  3, 1889) 
there  is  an  article  on  Totemism  by  Jos.  Jacobs,  who  comes  to  the 
conclusion  that,  although  not  only  certain  names  of  Edomite  and  even 
Israelite  tribes,  and  also  prohibitions  of  food,  family  feasts,  and  so 
forth,  possibly  allow  the  inference  of  pre-existing  totemism,  there 
cannot  be  a  thought  of  "  its  actual  existence  in  historic  times."  And 
it  is  with  historic  times  that  we  are  concerned. 

Note  XV.  p.  172.  —  The  name  Elohim,  which  is  a  plural  form, 
has  been  taken  by  many  to  prove  that  polytheism  was  the  original 
belief  of  the  Hebrews.  Baudissin  (Studien  zur  Semit.  Religion s- 
gesch..  Heft  I.  p.  55  ff.)  says  that  the  plural  designation  of  God 
can  only  have  arisen  through  the  ascription  to  One  of  all  the  powers 
that  resided  in  different  deities.  To  which  Baethgen  (Beitrage  zur 
Semitischen  Religionsgeschichte,  p.  132  ff.  and  p.  297)  objects  that 
this  is  to  give  to  the  word  an  origin  in  pantheism,  of  which  we  have 
no  trace  in  any  Old  Testament  writer ;  and  that  if  the  God  of  the 
Israelites  were  only  the  sum  of  all  other  gods,  he  could  not  be  set 
over  against  them  nor  over  them.  As  to  the  idea  that  the  plural 
form  may  have  been  a  summing  up  of  all  the  gods  or  divine  powers 


Notes.  503 

which  Israel  acknowledged,  he  objects  that,  in  that  case,  we  should 
have  expected  to  find  traces  of  the  names  of  such  other  supposed 
gods,  and  also  to  find  a  singular  noun  to  denote  one  of  the  Elohim. 
The  singular  word  Eloah,  which  at  all  events  is  poetical  and  rare, 
he  supposes  to  be  a  later  formation  from  the  plural  which  was  in 
common  use.  Max  Miiller  tells  us  (Selected  Essays,  vol.  ii.  p. 
414)  that  no  language  forms  a  plural  before  a  singular  ;  but  it 
cannot  be  denied  that  in  this  instance  the  singular  form  is  little 
used,  and  the  plural  word  is  used  not  only  to  denote  the  "  gods " 
collectively  of  the  nations,  but  even  to  denote  any  one  of  these  (see 
Judges  xi.  24  ;  1  Sam.  v.  7 ;  1  Kings  xi.  5 ;  2  Kings  i.  2,  3,  6,  16  ; 
Isa.  xxxvii.  38)  as  well  as  the  one  God  of  Israel.  Baethgen  empha- 
sises the  striking  fact  that  Israel,  from  whom  in  any  case  monothe- 
ism came,  is  the  only  Semitic  people  which  employs  this  plural  form 
of  the  divine  name,  whereas  all  the  other  Semitic  nations  have  a 
singular  name  for  deity,  even  though  they  were  polytheists  (ib.,  p. 
139).  If  the  name  did  not  indicate  from  the  beginning  a  plurality 
of  majesty  or  of  attributes,  it  can  at  most  only  be  taken  as  a  proof 
of  primeval  or  primitive  polytheism ;  but  it  cannot  be  taken  as  a 
proof  of  polytheism  after  the  time  of  Abraham.  Eobertson  Smith 
is  inclined  to  believe  that  the  idea  underlying  the  plural  Elohim  is 
that  of  "  vague  plurality  in  the  conception  of  the  Godhead  as  associ- 
ated with  special  spots,  .  .  .  and  that  not  in  the  sense  of  a  definite 
number  of  clearly  individualised  deities,  but  with  the  same  indefi- 
niteness  as  characterises  the  conception  of  the  jimi "  (Religion  of  the 
Semites,  first  series,  p.  426).  This  seems  to  be  the  sense  attached 
to  the  word  by  M.  Renan,  who  describes  the  Elohim  as  "  myriads 
of  active  beings  very  analogous  to  the  '  spirits '  of  savages,  living, 
translucid,  inseparable  in  some  sort  the  one  from  the  other,  not 
having  distinct  proper  names  like  the  Aryan  gods"  (Histoire  du 
Peuple  d'Israel,  i.  p.  30).  If  this  be  the  original  sense  attached  to 
the  name,  it  is  not  the  sense  as  given  by  the  Biblical  writers  to  their 
national  deity  within  the  times  of  which  w^e  speak  ;  or  if  the  Israel- 
ites at  the  time  of  the  prophets  or  from  the  time  of  Moses  believed 
in  the  existence  of  such  beings  as  are  here  described,  they  evidently 
ranked  them  as  very  inferior  to  the  national  God. 

Note  XVI.  p.  182. — The  expression  "the  Lord  of  hosts"  (Jahaveh 
Cebaoth)  is  found  in  a  double  sense  in  the  Old  Testament  writings. 
The  "hosts,"  in  the  one  case,  are  the  armies  of  Israel  (Exod.  vii.  4, 
xii.   41,  51  ;  compare   1  Sam.  xvii.   45)   whom   Jahaveh  leads  to 


504  Notes, 

victory  ;  and  this  use  is  found  in  the  early  historical  books,  having 
apparently  arisen  or  been  stimulated  by  the  military  experiences  of 
the  early  history.  In  the  prophets,  however  (see,  e.g.^  Hos.  xii. 
5),  we  see  that  the  expression  was  no  longer,  or  no  longer  simply, 
limited  in  reference  to  armies,  but  included  the  heavenly  host,  the 
stars  and  angels.  So  the  lxx.  often  render  by  the  word  iravTOKpaTwp. 
(See  art.  Zebaoth  in  Herzog-Plitt,  Eealencykl.,  vol.  xvii.  p.  427.) 
Sayce's  remark  might  give  the  impression  that  the  latter  use  is  the 
more  original,  and  some  have  concluded  that  this  reference  is  primi- 
tive. Against  this  view,  however,  has  to  be  set  the  fact  that  the 
expression  seems  to  have  come  into  use  in  connection  with  military 
exploits.  Kautzsch  has  pointed  out  (in  Stade's  Zeitschrift  fiir  Alttest, 
Wissenschaft,  1886,  p.  17)  that  in  the  connections  in  which  it  occurs 
in  the  early  historical  books,  it  either  is  closely  associated  with  the 
ark,  the  symbol  of  Jahaveh's  leadership,  or  otherwise  has  a  warlike 
reference.  Konig  has  also  pointed  out  (Hauptprobleme,  p.  50)  that 
the  host  of  heaven  is  denoted  by  the  singular  word,  not  by  the 
plural  ^ebaoth.  In  the  prophetic  (and  as  he  concludes  later)  use, 
this  plural  designation  embraces  both  the  earthly  and  the  heavenly 
hosts. 

Note  XVII.  p.  186. — For  a  thorough-going  treatment  of  the  Old 
Testament  on  the  mythological  method,  nothing  can  surpass  the 
work  of  Goldziher  (Mythology  among  the  Hebrews,  translated  by 
Russell  Martineau),  who  explains  the  characters  in  Genesis  and 
Judges  almost  uniformly  as  sky-myths.  I  do  not  think  that  the 
myth  of  the  dawn  is  now  taken  so  seriously  as  it  used  to  be.  The 
temptation,  however,  seems  to  be  strong  with  some  minds  to  look 
for  an  ancient  mythology  underlying  the  primeval  or  even  the 
patriarchal  history.  It  is  well  known  that  old  heathen  deities 
survive  under  the  guise  of  heroes  and  mythical  ancestors,  and  it  is 
therefore  quite  legitimate  to  examine  the  names  and  records  relating 
to  those  earliest  times,  to  see  whether  they  rest  on  such  a  mythical 
basis.  We  can  only  here  refer  to  attempts  that  have  been  made  in 
this  direction.  A  summary  statement  will  be  found  in  Baethgen's 
Beitrage  zur  Semitischen  Heligionsgeschichte,  p.  147  ff.  The  con- 
clusion to  which  he  comes  is,  that  any  speciousness  which  at  first 
sight  appears  in  the  identification  of  antediluvian  or  patriarchal 
names  with  faded  deities  disappears  on  closer  inspection,  either 
because  the  supposed  deities  are  not  otherwise  traceable  in  Semitic 
religion,  or  because  the  names  are  susceptible  of  a  much  simpler 


G 


Notes.  xf-^  "  '  ^05 

explanation,  or  because  the  explanations  given  break  down  at  the 
decisive  point.  As  to  the  story  of  Samson,  which  affords  such  ample 
scope  to  the  advocates  of  the  sun-myth  (Steinthal,  Zeitschrift  fur 
Volkerpsychologie,  1862,  ii.  p.  129  ff,,  translated  in  Goldziher's 
work),  it  has  always  seemed  to  me  that  the  mythological  features  are 
too  strongly  marked  for  the  period  at  which  Samson  is  placed — i.e., 
he  is  surrounded,  in  the  period  of  the  Judges,  by  characters  so 
thoroughly  human,  that  he  would  be  a  glaring  literary  anachronism 
as  a  pure  sun-myth.  It  may  be  that  some  traits  of  the  story  are 
coloured  by  folk-lore  (though,  on  the  other  hand,  there  are  others 
that  will  not  be  constrained  into  mythology  by  even  the  most  violent 
methods),  but  that  is  very  different  from  saying  that  he  was  not  a 
hero  such  as  the  story  paints  him.  Any  traces  of  mythology  to  be 
found  in  the  Old  Testament  are  far  less  elaborate.  They  may  be 
said  to  be  mere  traces,  either  remains  of  an  extinct  system  or  rudi- 
ments that  were  never  developed, — such  as  the  references  to  the 
"  sons  of  God  and  the  daughters  of  men,"  Rahab,  Leviathan,  Tannin, 
and  suchlike.  These,  it  should  be  observed,  as  they  lie  before  us  in 
the  books,  are  handled  with  perfect  candour  and  simplicity,  as  if  to 
the  writers  they  had  become  divested  of  all  dangerous  or  misleading 
associations,  or  were  even  nothing  more  than  figures  of  speech.  They 
may,  in  part,  as  Flockner  and  Baethgen  suggest,  have  been  adopted 
from  non-Hebraic  sources,  just  as  classical  allusions  are  found  in 
modern  poets.  I  cannot  in  a  brief  note  go  as  fully  into  the  question 
as  I  should  like,  but  I  have  a  very  strong  impression  that  in  the 
particular  of  the  "Dawn,"  which  Cheyne  seems  to  think  points  to  a 
whole  system  of  early  mythology,  we  have  a  crucial  instance  of  the 
different  mental  attitudes  of  the  Hebrew  and  Aryan  races.  I  believe 
there  is  no  Semitic  heathen  god  of  the  dawn,  nor  in  the  Hebrew 
Scriptures  any  hint  of  the  contest  of  light  with  darkness.  The  name 
of  the  dawn  in  Hebrew  is  indubitably  based  on  the  idea  of  darhiess, 
so  that  the  dawn  is  primarily  the  Morgendcimmerung,  not  the 
Morgenrothe.  I  should  say  that  we  have  an  undoubted  instance  of 
its  use  in  this  sense  in  Joel  ii.  2,  "dawn  spread  upon  the  mountains" 
— an  exact  picture  of  the  gloom  caused  by  the  cloud  of  locusts.  And 
I  venture  to  suggest  to  scholars  the  possibility  of  giving  the  same 
sense  to  the  word  in  the  much-discussed  passage  Isaiah  viii.  20, 
which,  without  the  supplying  of  a  single  word  or  any  violence  to 
grammar,  might  read,  "  To  the  law  and  to  the  testimony :  should 
they  not  speak  according  to  this  word,  which  has  no  dimness  1 "  The 
standing  phrase  the  "dawn  went  up"  may  thus  primarily  mean  the 


506  Notes. 

rising  up  of  the  black  cover  of  night,  so  that  the  sun,  the  only  source 
of  light,  may  appear ;  and  if  so,  the  passage  in  Job  (xxxviii.  12  f.) 
would  be  all  the  more  striking.  The  subject  is  worth  more  study 
than  it  seems  to  have  received.  Cheyne  in  his  last  commentary 
(The  Book  of  Psalms)  shows  a  growing  tendency  to  notice  myths 
or  supposed  myths  alluded  to  or  lying  under  Biblical  expressions. 
When  attention  is  at  every  turn  drawn  in  this  way  to  the  eyelids  of 
the  dawn,  the  sides  of  the  north,  the  sun  as  a  bridegroom  or  strong 
man,  the  speech  of  the  day,  the  gates  of  death,  and  so  forth,  and  the 
mythological  beliefs  of  other  (even  non-Semitic)  peoples  are  adduced 
in  connection,  the  ordinary  reader  can  hardly  be  blamed  for  con- 
cluding that  the  Hebrew  writers  employing  such  expressions  were 
on  the  level  of  heathen  mythologisers.  No  doubt,  the  qualifica- 
tion is  sometimes  added  that  the  myth  is  old  or  faded  or  primitive. 
But  if  so,  how  old  is  it  ?  And  what  proof  is  there  that  it  was  ever 
more  developed  than  we  find  it  1  And  then,  on  this  mode  of  inter- 
pretation, how  much  poetry  will  be  left  us  ?  Religious  language  is 
always  metaphorical ;  the  crisis  in  the  religious  life  of  a  people 
comes  when  either  the  metaphor  is  to  run  away  with  the  thought, 
or  the  mind  control  the  metaphor  ;  and  I  maintain  that  the  Hebrew 
writers,  from  the  earliest  point  we  can  reach  them,  though  saturated 
with  poetry,  are  free  from  mythology  in  the  ordinary  sense.  At  all 
events,  I  would  submit  that  these  references  are  singularly  out  of 
place  in  a  commentary,  unless  they  are  historically  attested  at  the 
time  of  the  writer.  If  it  is  the  main  object  of  a  commentator  to 
exhibit  the  mind  of  the  writer  commented  on,  nothing  but  confusion 
can  arise  from  suggesting  to  the  reader  thoughts  which  could  hardly 
have  been  in  the  writer's  mind.  It  is  all  the  more  out  of  place  when 
the  literature  under  consideration  is  post-prophetic.  Whatever  may 
be  said  of  the  low  level  from  which  religious  ideas  among  the 
Hebrews  started,  it  will  scarcely  be  maintained  that  they  had  a 
conscious  belief  in  these  nature-myths  by  the  time  of  the  exilic  or 
post-exilic  literature. 

Note  XVIII.  p.  195. — David  occupies  so  distinguished  a  position  in 
the  Biblical  theory  of  the  history  that  heroic  measures  have  to  be 
taken  on  the  modern  theory  to  explain  his  true  standing.  His 
personal  character  and  tlie  religion  of  his  time  are  described  by 
Renan  in  terms  which  it  is  not  worth  while  to  transcribe  (Histoire 
du  Peuple  d'Israel,  torn.  ii.  chap,  i.,  v.)  A  word  may  here  be  said 
as  to  the  ascription  to  him  by  the  Biblical  tradition  of  the  gift  of 


Notes.  507 

song.  (See  above,  p.  93.)  Vatke,  relying  on  Amos  vi.  5,  6,  says  that 
the  Davidic  muse  had  scarcely  the  predominant  religious  tendency 
which  a  later  age  presupposed.  And  Robertson  Smith  goes  the  length 
of  saying  :  "  It  is  very  curious  that  the  book  of  Amos  represents 
David  as  the  chosen  model  of  the  dilettanti  nobles  of  Ephraim,  who 
lay  stretched  on  beds  of  ivory,  anointed  with  the  choicest  perfumes, 
and  mingling  music  with  their  cups  in  the  familiar  manner  of  ori- 
ental luxury  "  (0.  T.  in  the  Jewish  Church,  p.  205).  It  is  "  very 
curious,"  certainly,  that  a  learned  professor  should  make  such  an 
assertion,  for  Amos  does  no  such  thing.  All  that  the  prophet  says 
about  David  in  this  connection  is,  that  the  nobles  in  question  "  de- 
vise for  themselves  instruments  of  music  like  David."  To  make  the 
comparison  extend  to  the  whole  passage  is  monstrous.  The  prophet 
tells  the  luxurious  nobles  that  they  are  enjoying  everything  that  is 
best  themselves,  but  "  are  not  grieved  for  the  affliction  of  Joseph  "  ; 
and  if  there  is  any  inference  to  be  drawn  as  to  David's  musical 
attainments,  it  is  this,  that  his  instruments  had  the  fame  of  being 
the  ne  plus  ultra  of  their  kind.  There  may  be — probably  there  is — 
irony  in  the  prophet's  words,  as  one  might  describe  as  a  Solomon  a 
person  who  made  great  pretence  to  wisdom.  When  Isaiah  utters  a 
woe  upon  those  who  "are  mighty  to  drink  wine,  and  men  of  strength 
to  mingle  strong  drink"  (Isa.  v.  22),  he  does  not  mean  that  all  ath- 
letes are  drunkards.  The  view  of  Amos  in  regard  to  the  position 
of  David  in  history  is  found  in  chap.  ix.  11. 

Note  XIX.  p.  259.  —  From  the  form  of  the  question  in  Amos 
V.  25,  and  the  emphatic  position  of  the  word  "sacrifices"  in  the 
original,  it  may  be  concluded  that  the  prophet  expected  a  negative 
answer  to  the  question,  "  Did  ye  offer  sacrifices  to  me  in  the  wilder- 
ness forty  years,  0  house  of  Israel  1"  But  this  being  admitted,  the 
difficulties  of  the  passage  only  begin.  Did  he  mean  to  refer  to  the 
desert  period  as  a  good  time,  and  imply — It  was  not  sacrifice  that 
constituted  the  good  feature  of  Israel's  behaviour  then  ?  Or  did  he 
mean  to  say  that  even  in  the  desert  they  were  a  rebellious  corrupt 
people,  or  a  people  under  displeasure  to  such  an  extent  that  sacrifice 
would  not  have  been  accepted  from  them  ?  Both  Amos  (ii.  10)  and 
Hosea  (ix.  10,  xi.  1  ff.)  refer  to  the  time  of  the  desert  as  one  of 
favour  shown  by  Jahaveh  ;  but  this  is  not  inconsistent  with  the 
view  that  they  were  even  then  a  rebellious  and  backsliding  people, 
as  even  these  prophets,  as  well  as  the  historical  writers,  indicate. 
It  may  be,  as  Bredenkamp  maintains,  that  the  forty  years  is  given 


508  Notes. 

as  a  round  number  to  indicate  the  greater  part  of  the  period — viz., 
thirty-eight  years — when  the  people  were  under  chastisement  (see 
Deut.  ix.  7  fF.  ;  Josh.  v.  6),  and  excluding  the  two  years  spent  about 
Sinai,  when  the  legal  system  is  represented  as  having  been  organised. 
Apart  from  this,  however,  the  difficulties  of  the  passage  in  the  present 
connection  begin  at  v.  26.  For  whereas  some  writers  (as  Daumer 
and  Kuenen)  see  a  reference  to  the  past,  and  make  the  prophet 
declare  that  this  idolatrous  worship  was  practised  in  the  desert, 
others  (as  Robertson  Smith,  Konig,  Schrader,  &c.)  take  the  reference 
to  be  to  the  future,  "  So  shall  ye  take  up  (viz.,  on  the  road  to  exile) 
the  stake  (or  column)  of  your  king,  and  the  pedestal  of  your  images," 
&c.  (see  Queen's  Printer's  Bible).  Bredenkamp  (Gesetz  u.  Pro- 
pheten,  p.  83  ff.,  who  takes  v.  26  to  refer  to  the  loasf)  discusses  the 
passage  at  some  length.  See  also  Robertson  Smith,  Prophets,  pp. 
140,  399  ;  Wellhausen,  Hist.,  p.  56  ;  Konig,  Hauptprobleme,  p.  9. 
As  to  the  idolatrous  objects  named,  see  Schrader,  Cuneiform 
Inscriptions,  Eng.  tr.,  vol,  ii.  p.  141  f.  Why  is  it,  by  the  way, 
that  Amos  should  be  considered  such  an  authority  on  the  stars  in 
this  passage,  and  yet  not  be  allowed  to  be  the  author  of  passages 
that  speak  of  them  in  connection  with  Jahaveh's  greatness  1  (Amos 
V.  8). 

Note  XX.  p.  262. — Daumer,  of  course,  makes  a  great  deal  of  all 
these  cases  (pp.  26  ff.),  arguing  that  the  expression  "  before  the 
Lord"  denotes  a  formal  religious  act  or  ceremony  of  worship.  It 
may  be  conceded  that  the  expression  has  a  religious  reference — ^.e., 
that  it  was  under  a  strong  religious  impulse  that  Samuel  slew 
Agag,  and  that  David  thought  he  was  performing  a  "  religious  duty," 
as  we  say,  in  giving  up  Saul's  descendants  to  what  was  no  doubt  a 
cruel  and  unmerited  late.  All  this,  however,  is  far  from  proving 
that  human  sacrifice  was  part  of  the  recognised  worship.  That  the 
sacredness  of  human  life  was  not  so  great  in  the  age  of  David  and 
Samuel  as  to  outweigh  what  was  regarded  as  a  sacred  obligation  or 
blood  claim  on  the  other  side,  need  not  surprise  any  one  who  believes 
in  a  progressive  education  in  morality.  When  (not  so  long  ago)  men 
were  hanged  in  this  country  for  sheep-stealing,  it  was  done  in  obe- 
dience to  what  were  regarded  as  the  sacred  demands  of  justice.  See 
Mozley's  *  Ruling  Ideas  in  Early  Ages.' 

Note  XXI.  p.  302. — The  distinction  between  monotheism  and  nion- 
olatry  is  one  that  it  is  easy  for  us  to  draw.     At  the  same  time,  the 


Notes.  609 

important  point  in  this  discussion  is  whether  the  Israelites  wor- 
shipped only  one  God,  and  what  was  the  character  they  assigned  to 
Him.  It  is  quite  probable  that  it  never  occurred  to  them  to  ask 
themselves  what  precisely  were  the  gods  of  the  nations  around  them  ; 
and,  as  is  shown  in  the  text,  had  they  put  such  a  question,  they 
would  very  probably  have  been  at  a  loss  for  an  answer.  We  must 
not  look  in  the  Old  Testament  for  what  it  does  not  profess  to  give. 
Max  Miiller  speaks  of  a  primitive  intuition  of  God  which  he  calls 
henotheism ;  which  in  itself  is  neither  monotheistic  nor  polytheistic, 
though,  it  might  become  either,  according  to  the  expression  which  it 
took  in  the  languages  of  men  (Selected  Essays,  vol.  ii.  p.  412  f.) 
His  well-known  explanation  of  the  monotheistic  turn  of  the  Semitic 
races  is  that  their  languages  enabled  those  using  them  to  keep  in 
memory  the  predicative  or  appellative  sense  of  words,  so  that  they 
did  not  run  into  nomina,  which  were  confounded  with  numina. 
But  the  question  always  recurs,  Whence  this  peculiar  build  of  lan- 
guage, if  not  from  the  mind  of  those  forming  and  employing  it  ?  So 
that  the  problem  why  the  Semitic  race  (or  a  part  of  them)  thought 
in  this  peculiar  way,  is  no  nearer  solution  on  a  merely  philological 
basis.     (Compare  above,  p.  189.) 

Note  XXII.  pp.  313  and  338.— Sfade  also,  though  he  speaks  of  an 
intimate  relation  between  Jahaveh  and  Israel  as  subsisting  from 
Mosaic  times,  yet  maintains  that  the  designation  of  this  relation 
as  a  covenant  cannot  be  proved  anterior  to  the  seventh  century 
(Gesch.,  i.  p.  507).  The  Hebrew  word  for  covenant  (  yi;  )  is  no 
doubt  etymologically  connected  with  a  verb  ( '-)  )  to  cut,  and  in  its 
derivation,  and  in  the  usual  connection  with  the  verb  n  2  (to  cut), 
there  is  clear  reference  to  sacrificial  rites  in  connection  with  its  rati- 
fication. (See  Gen.  xv.  and  Delitzsch's  Comment.)  Eobertson  Smith 
has  pointed  out  the  old  Arab  usages  in  this  matter  (Kinship  and 
Marriage,  p.  47  ff.  ;  Eeligion  of  the  Semites,  296  fi^.)  He  says,  how- 
ever, very  appositely,  that  "  a  nation  like  Israel  is  not  a  natural  unity 
like  a  clan,  and  Jehovah,  as  the  national  God,  was,  from  the  time  of 
Moses  downward,  no  mere  natural  clan  god,  but  the  god  of  a  con- 
federation, so  that  here  the  idea  of  a  covenant  religion  is  entirely 
justified."  He  thus  seems  to  take  the  original  sense  of  the  word  as 
<rvvd'f}K'n,  with  a  reciprocal  sense.  Others,  less  properly,  give  it  the 
sense  of  ZiaQ-qK-t],  from  the  idea  of  decision,  determination,  and  then 
institution.  Though  this  is  not  to  be  maintained,  and  though  the 
obligations  resting  upon  God,  as  one  party  to  the  covenant,  may  not 


510  Notes. 

be  brought  into  the  foreground,  as  being  understood,  yet  we  cannot 
conceive  of  a  covenant  without  obligations,  in  the  form  of  commands, 
resting  on  man.  Even  Jeremiah's  new  covenant  implies  a  law  (Jer. 
xxxi.  33).  See  Bredenkamp,  Gesetz  und  Propheten,  p.  22,  and  his 
reff. 

Note  XXIII.  p.  316. — It  seems  to  be  generally  taken  for  granted, 
without  proof,  that  the  early  Israelites  knew  little  of  the  great 
outside  world.  Robertson  Smith,  e.g.,  says  of  the  times  of  Amos, 
"We  are  led  to  suppose  that  the  very  name  of  Assyria  was  un- 
known to  the  mass  of  the  Hebrews"  (Prophets,  p.  91).  He 
admits,  however,  that  Amos  himself  knew  with  surprising  exact- 
ness the  history  and  geography  of  all  the  nations  with  whom  the 
Hebrews  had  any  converse  ;  but  instead  of  taking  one  man  as 
the  type  of  many,  as  he  does  in  the  case  of  Micah  the  image-maker 
in  the  book  of  Judges,  he  supposes  that  Amos  had  been  a  great 
traveller  (ibid.,  p.  128  f.)  For  my  part,  I  do  not  see  any  reason 
to  think  that  Amos,  who  tells  us  plainly  what  his  manner  of  life 
was,  differed  in  this  particular  from  the  average  man  of  his  time. 
When  the  Franco-Prussian  war  was  raging  in  Europe,  there  were 
numbers  of  Druze  peasants  in  Lebanon,  who  had  never  been  on  a 
boat,  inquiring  eagerly  day  by  day  for  news  of  the  campaign,  and 
following  closely  the  fortunes  of  the  combatants.  Palestine  was 
not  so  large  a  country,  nor  its  people  in  those  times  so  dull,  that  the 
great  Phoenician  trade  could,  be  carried  on  about  their  borders 
without  their  having  some  knowledge  of  the  great  world.  Jero- 
boam was  not  the  only  adventurer  that  went  from  Palestine  to 
Egypt,  nor  was  Jonah  the  only  Jewish  youth  that  ran  away  to  sea. 
It  has  generally  been  taken  for  granted  that  it  was  only  after  the 
advance  westward  of  the  Assyrian  power  about  the  eighth  century 
that  Israel  came  to  know  of  the  great  Eastern  world  (Knobel,  Die 
Bticher  Numeri,  &c.,  p.  579)  ;  but  are  we  to  believe  that  a  people 
who  traced  the  origin  of  Abraham  to  the  East  supposed  that  all  that 
region  had  disappeared,  or  ceased  to  talk  about  it  ?  The  tenacity 
with  which  old  traditions  cling  to  the  oriental  mind  is  illustrated 
by  the  fact  that  the  inhabitants  of  Syria  at  the  present  day  speak 
of  the  Russians  as  Muskdhi  or  Muscovites,  a  recollection  of  the 
period  when  Moscow  was  the  capital  (although  the  name  Russia  is 
known  to  old  writers).  And  I  would  offer  the  conjecture  for  what- 
ever it  may  be  worth,  that  the  name  of  Babel  (for  Babylon)  retained 
similarly  its  hold  on  the  Israelite  memory  as  a  designation  of  the 


Notes.  611 

great  Eastern  country,  in  which  the  supremacy  oscillated  between 
Babylon  and  Assyria.  Schrader  tells  us  (Cuneiform  Inscriptions, 
on  Genesis  xxxvi.  31)  that  the  name  Israel  does  not  occur  in  the 
Inscriptions  as  a  general  name  for  the  Israelites,  nor  does  it  appear, 
as  a  rule,  as  the  name  of  the  northern  kingdom,  the  designation  ol 
which  is  usually  "land  of  the  house  of  Omri."  This  fact  is  full 
of  suggestiveness  as  to  the  way  in  which  "sources"  may  be  used. 

Note  XXIV.  pp.  336,  369. — One  of  those  general  statements  made 
without  reflection  on  its  foundation  or  significance,  is  that  the 
Israelites  who  left  Egypt  at  the  exodus  were  a  horde  of  slaves. 
We  must,  no  doubt,  accept  it  as  the  best  evidence  of  their  servitude 
there  that  the  national  consciousness  of  a  people  otherwise  proud 
of  their  freedom,  retained  so  vivid  a  recollection  of  their  hard 
bondage  and  of  the  "  high  hand "  by  which  they  were  delivered. 
Stade's  off-hand  dictum  that  if  any  Hebrew  clan  ever  sojourned  in 
Egypt  no  one  knows  its  name,  is  (not  to  speak  of  the  difficulty  of 
finding  traces  of  the  Hyksos  themselves  in  Egypt)  opposed  to  the 
whole  testimony  of  the  nation,  and,  besides,  leaves  no  room  for  the 
development  of  the  pre-prophetic  ideas  which  he  himself  is  so  fond 
of  tracing.  But  if  we  admit  that  the  sojourn  of  the  people  in  Egypt 
was  a  historical  fact,  we  must  consider  what  it  implies.  The  things 
that  make  the  deepest  impression  on  the  memory  are  not  necessarily 
those  that  make  the  most  lasting  impression  on  character.  Al- 
though their  life  was  at  one  time  made  "  bitter  in  mortar  and  in 
bricks,  and  in  all  manner  of  service  in  the  field,"  we  are  not  to 
suppose  that  this  went  on  from  generation  to  generation.  Even 
during  the  time  of  this  hard  service  it  is  probable,  judging  by  the 
customs  of  forced  labour  in  the  East,  and  hints  in  the  Hebrew 
narrative,  that  they  were  far  from  being,  as  perhaps  the  popular 
conception  represents  them,  an  unorganised  gang  of  slaves.  They 
would  be  arranged  and  drawn  for  labour  by  their  families  and  under 
their  own  chief  or  heads  (Exod.  v.  14  ff.)  And  we  know  not  what 
amount  of  organisation  they  had  reached,  or  what  experience  of 
ordinary  life  they  had  gained  during  a  residence  of  several  genera- 
tions in  a  country  like  Egypt.  The  Egyptian  fellaMn  in  the  time 
of  Mehemet  Ali  were  probably  as  much  oppressed  as  the  ancient 
Israelites.  Yet,  with  an  army  of  such  men,  forced  into  the  ranks, 
and  fed  on  black  bread  and  onions,  Ibrahim  Pasha  drove  the  Turks 
from  Syria,  "  The  History  of  Israel,"  says  Delitzsch  (Introd.  to  his 
Commentary  on  Genesis),  "does  nut  begin  with  the  condition  of 


512  Notes. 

an  ignorant,  rude,  and  undisciplined,  horde,  but  with  the  transition 
to  a  nation  of  a  race  which  had  come  to  maturity  amidst  the  most 
abundant  means  and.  examples  «f  culture."  He  points  out  also  the 
influence  of  the  legalism  and  multiformity  of  Egyptian  national  and 
private  life  as  seen  in  the  laws  of  the  Pentateuch  ;  and  dates  from 
the  sojourn  in  Egypt  the  first  impulse  to  literary  activity  among 
the  Hebrews.  I  do  not  know  that  there  is  anything  incredible  in 
the  supposition  that  the  book  of  the  Covenant  may  be  the  codifica- 
tion of  law  and  custom  that  prevailed  even  in  Egypt  (The  King- 
dom of  all  Israel,  by  James  Sime,  1883,  chap.  v.  This  is  a  book 
that  no  doubt  will  be  considered  wild  by  critics,  but  is  deserving 
of  attention  for  the  intelligent  and  honest  effort  to  treat  the  Old 
Testament  by  the  same  rules  of  historical  research  as  have  "  been 
applied  in  verifying  the  literature  of  Greece  and  Rome  "). 

Note  XXV.  p.  344. — There  is  another  passage  in  Hosea  which  may 
be  referred  to  in  this  connection,  not  so  much  because  of  the  positive 
evidence  which  it  furnishes,  as  because  it  has  been  explained  away 
by  those  who  maintain  that  at  the  time  of  that  prophet  the  Levitical 
aspect  of  the  law  is  scarcely  perceivable.  In  Hosea  iv.  4  we  read, 
"Thy  people  are  as  they  that  strive  with  the  priest ;"  and  advocates 
of  the  early  existence  of  the  Deuterononiic  Code  see  in  it  a  reference 
to  Deut.  xvii.  12,  where  it  is  said,  "The  man  that  doeth  presumptu- 
ously is  not  hearkening  unto  the  priest,  .  .  .  even  that  man  shall 
die."  On  the  other  hand,  the  advocates  of  the  late  production  of 
the  Levitical  Code,  and  of  the  lateness  of  the  priestly  authority  gen- 
erally, seek  to  explain  the  passage  as  if  it  contained  a  false  or  cor- 
rupt reading.  I  think  that  the  explanation  given  by  them  of  the 
expression,  '*As  they  that  strive  with  the  priest,"  is  very  frigid  and 
weak  ;  and  I  am  prepared  to  defend  the  reading  on  purely  gram- 
matical and  literary  grounds.  The  construction  of  the  particle 
'ka'ph  (meaning  like)  with  a  participle  is  found  in  Hosea  in  so 
marked  a  manner  that  it  may  be  said  to  be  an  usus  loquendi  of  that 
prophet.  Thus  in  one  passage  (v.  10)  he  says,  "The  princes  of 
Judah  are  like  them  that  remove  the  landmark  ; "  and  in  another 
place  (xi.  4),  "  I  was  to  them  as  they  that  take  off  the  yoke  on  their 
jaws ;  "  and  in  another  passage  (vi.  9),  "  Like  the  waylayers  of  men." 
Cf.  also  the  expression,  "  Like  the  dew  that  early  goeth  away " 
(vi,  4).  Such  a  usage  as  this,  I  think,  guarantees  the  reading  when 
there  is  no  external  evidence  against  it,  and  the  expression,  more- 
over, read  as  it  stands,  fits  the  context  better  than  the  reading  pro- 


Notes.  513 

posed.     See  Robertson  Smith's  discussion  of  the  passage,  Prophets, 
p.  405  f. 

Note  XXVI.  p.  383.— Not  only  is  it  the  case  that  the  dates  of  the 
"sources"  are  variously  given  by  various  critics,  and  that  two  at 
least  of  the  sources  (J  and  E)  present  a  hitherto  insoluble  problem, 
but  it  is  plain  that  critics  like  Dillmann  and  Noldeke  have  come  to 
very  different  conclusions  as  to  the  development  of  the  history  from 
the  school  of  AVellhausen  and  Kucnen.  Quite  recently,  too,  we  have 
liad  Klostermann  putting  forward  a  revolutionary  view  as  to  the 
original  documents  (Neue  Kirkl.  Zeitschr.,  i.  618  ff.,  693  ff.  Com- 
pare Presbyterian  and  Reformed  Review,  April  1891).  And  not 
to  speak  of  the  small  school  represented  by  M.  Vernes,  the  articles 
of  Halevy  appearing  in  the  '  Revue  des  Etudes  Juives '  show  that  he 
is  far  from  accepting  the  current  conclusions  of  criticism.  If  it  should 
come  to  be  accepted — as  the  discoveries  of  archaeology  and  the  fail- 
ures of  criticism  seem  to  indicate  that  it  will — that  literary  activity 
was  much  older  and  more  common  in  Israel  than  is  now  admitted, 
we  shall  probably  the  better  understand  how,  side  by  side  with  the 
growth  and  modification  of  religious  observances,  there  went  on  a 
rewTiting  and  modification  of  books  ;  which  is,  on  all  points  of  view, 
a  more  likely  thing  than  the  supposition  of  literature  produced  in 
the  mass  for  certain  specific  temporary  purposes.  As  to  the  dating 
very  far  apart  of  documents  that  now  lie  side  by  side,  the  critics 
themselves  see  no  incongruity  in  two  contemporaneous  prophets, 
Amos  and  Hosea,  the  one  saying  nothing  against  the  calves,  and  the 
other  making  them  the  very  root  of  Israel's  sin  (R.  Smith,  Prophets, 
p.  175).  Nay,  they  find  in  the  person  of  Jeremiah  two  tendencies  on 
this  subject  of  law  that  are  quite  contradictory  (see  chap.  xvii.  p.  451). 
I  will  venture  to  add  that  the  mode  of  composition,  and  transition 
from  one  style  to  another  seen  frequently  in  oriental  authors,  should 
be  a  warning  not  to  push  the  "  separation  of  sources  "  too  far.  Lane 
incidentally  (Modern  Egyptians,  5th  ed.,  vol.  i.  p.  271  f.)  furnishes 
an  example,  which  could  be  paralleled  by  quotations  from  almost 
any  Arabic  author.  He  gives  a  long  passage  taken  down  to  the  dicta- 
tion of  his  informant,  and  relating  a  vision  of  the  prophet  which  was 
given  to  one  Mohammed  el-Bahaee  to  settle  a  difficult  matter  of 
tradition.  The  narrator  first  relates  his  vision,  apparently  in  full- 
est detail,  till  he  "  awoke  from  sleep  joyful  and  happy."  He  then 
goes  on  to  tell  how  he  visited  his  teacher  to  report  the  occurrence, 
and  in  this  relation  brings  in  quite  a  new  set  of  details  that  were  not 

2  K 


514  Notes. 

hinted  at  in  the  first  narrative.  The  two  accounts  show  so  much 
variety  that  they  could  easily  be  ascribed  to  different  writers,  and  it 
would  be  very  easy  to  make  out  that  the  latter  is  very  much  later 
than  the  former.  But,  indeed,  the  Koran  itself,  uniform  as  it  is 
above  most  Arab  works,  exhibits  quite  a  number  of  styles  and  not  a 
few  divergent  tendencies. 

Note  XXVII.  p.  405. — A  few  words  may  here  be  said  on  the  view 
of  Wellhausen  and  his  school  that  "the  kingdom  which  bore  the 
name  of  Israel  was  actually  in  point  of  fact  in  the  olden  time  the 
proper  Israel,  and  Judah  was  merely  a  kind  of  appendage  to  it" 
(Hist,  of  Israel,  p.  188).  Kobertson  Smith  of  course  repeats  the 
statement,  even  to  the  corroborative  proof  of  the  cedar  of  Lebanon 
overshadowing  the  thistle  that  grows  at  its  foot  (2  Kings  xiv.  9  ; 
Prophets,  pp.  93,  137).  The  remark  might  be  allowed  to  pass  if  it 
referred  merely  to  political  importance,  for  the  northern  kingdom 
was  larger  and  nearer  to  the  great  powers  that  moulded  history  in 
those  days.  Yet  happy  is  the  people  that  has  no  history.  The 
dynastic  changes  and  internal  troubles  of  the  northern  kingdom  are 
in  strange  contrast  with  the  long  quiet  reigns  of  the  southern  king- 
dom ;  and  from  this  point  of  view  the  sweeping  statement  of  Well- 
hausen is  a  iniori  improbable— viz.,  that  "  religiously  the  relative 
importance  of  the  two  corresponded  pretty  nearly  to  what  it  was 
politically  and  historically."  Israel,  he  says,  "  was  the  cradle  of 
prophecy ;  Samuel,  Elijah,  and  Elisha  exercised  their  activity  there. 
What  contemporary  figure  from  Judah  is  there  to  place  alongside  of 
these?"  Why,  Samuel  belongs  to  the  undivided  kingdom,  a  proof, 
even  if  we  had  not  stronger  ones,  that  the  cradle  of  prophecy  is  not 
to  be  located  on  geographical  considerations.  And  who  were  Nathan 
and  Gad  ;  and  where  did  Amos  come  from  ?  Isaiah  himself  cannot 
be  a  sudden  apparition  in  Judah.  The  quiet  of  the  little  southern 
state,  the  prestige  of  Jerusalem,  the  disposition  to  rest  on  the  past, 
all  speak  for  Jerusalem  as  the  centre  of  religious  life,  and  for  the 
Davidic  house  as,  in  religious  regard,  something  quite  different  from 
the  northern  kingdom.  Palestine  is  not  so  large,  nor  were  the 
boundaries  of  the  two  kingdoms  so  firmly  set  by  nature,  that  the 
mere  distance  of  a  few  miles  could  make  much  dillerence  in  the 
social  and  religious  condition  of  the  people.  Yet  the  tone  of  the 
northern  prophets,  who  seem  to  have  had  before  them  a  w^orship  full 
of  idolatry,  differs  so  much  from  that  of  the  prophets  of  the  south, 
who  reprove  the  people  for  too  much  attention  to  forms,  that  we 


Notes.  515 

must  recognise  a  difference  in  the  religious  associations  and  standing 
of  the  two  kingdoms. 

Note  XXVIII.,  p.  427. — In  Cheyne's  Jeremiah,  His  Life  and 
Times,  pp.  69-86,  the  English  reader  will  find  in  an  accessible  and 
comprehensive  form  a  statement  of  the  main  critical  positions  in 
regard  to  the  date  and  authorship  of  Deuteronomy.  It  does  not 
fall  within  the  scope  of  the  present  work  to  enter  into  critical  ques- 
tions as  to  the  composition  of  hooks,  and  I  have  stated  my  reasons 
for  believing  that  the  Biblical  theory  of  the  history  is  not  inconsis- 
tent with  the  supposition  of  a  late  date  for  the  book  of  Deuter- 
onomy. A  good  many  of  the  statements  of  Professor  Cheyne  are, 
I  think,  quite  controvertible  ;  but  I  can  only  refer  briefly  to  one  or 
two  points  bearing  on  the  theory  of  the  history.  For  instance,  he 
does  not  seem  to  take  any  account  of  the  possibility  of  one  in  Moses' 
position  foreseeing  (in  the  ordinary  and  literal  sense  of  the  word) 
what  was  most  likely  to  happen  alter  the  occupation  of  Canaan. 
And  when  he  tells  us  that  the  author  of  Deuteronomy  "is  full  of 
allusions  to  circumstances  which  did  not  exist  till  long  after  Moses  " 
(p.  71),  and,  guided  by  such  allusions,  brings  the  date  later  and  later 
down  till  he  reaches  the  age  of  Manasseh  or  Josiah,  he  somewhat 
invalidates  his  own  argument  by  adding  that,  after  the  promulgation 
of  Deuteronomy,  "even  very  near  Jerusalem  the  reformation  was 
but  slight"  (p.  73).  For  it  is  always  open  to  the  objector  to  argue 
that,  if  breaches  of  the  law  are  found  after  the  solemn  national 
adoption  of  it,  the  earlier  "circumstances"  alluded  to  are  no  proof 
that,  at  the  time  of  their  occurrence,  such  a  law  had  not  been 
promulgated.  What  I  particularly  dispute,  however,  is  the  state- 
ment that  the  fundamental  idea  of  the  holy  people  is  Isaiah's,  and 
that  "  it  was  that  great  prophet's  function  to  transfer  the  conception 
of  holiness  from  the  physical  to  the  moral  sphere"  (p.  73).  Such 
a  statement,  even  with  the  qualification  added  to  it  that  "others 
had  laboured  in  the  same  direction,"  is  to  my  mind  altogether  in- 
adequate, in  view  of  the  writings  of  Amos  and  Hosea,  the  book  of 
the  Covenant,  and  anything  that  can  at  all  be  ascribed  to  Moses 
himself.  Whether  the  word  be  there  or  not,  the  idea  of  a  people 
separated  from  other  nations  in  belief  and  practice,  and  constituted 
as  a  people  on  an  ethical  basis,  is  fundamental  and  Mosaic ;  and  it 
is  only  on  such  a  supposition  that  it  can  be  asserted  with  any  proper 
significance  that  Deuteronomy  is  in  spirit  Mosaic.  But,  indeed,  is 
it  not  conceivable  that  this  Deuteronomic  spirit  was  a  thing  of 


516  Notes. 

development  and  growth,  having  its  germ  in  the  Mosaic  religion, 
and,  instead  of  appearing  for  the  first  time  in  one  late  age,  coming 
to  maturity  in  the  course  of  the  history  ?  In  other  words,  instead 
of  saying  that  Deuteronomy  speaks  as  its  authors  supposed  Moses 
would  have  spoken  had  he  been  alive,  and  that  it  abolished  things 
which  Moses  might  have  tolerated  in  his  own  day,  but  would  have 
condemned  had  he  lived  later  (p.  78  f.),  I  think  we  get  a  more 
reasonable  view  of  the  matter  if  we  suppose  that  it  is  the  final 
expression,  in  the  light  of  history,  of  views  that  had  been  germinat- 
ing in  the  minds  of  good  men  from  the  days  of  Moses,  the  exposi- 
tion of  principles  so  firmly  rooted  in  their  minds  that  the  writers 
in  all  sincerity  regarded  them  as  Mosaic.  It  is  one  thing  to  ascribe 
to  early  times  an  institution  which  exists  and  has  long  existed,  or 
an  idea  or  tone  of  thought  which  is  well  defined  and  deeply  rooted  ; 
it  is  not  so  easy  to  conceive  of  this  being  done  with  institutions 
newly  set  up,  or  ideas  for  the  first  time  formulated.  This  distinc- 
tion would,  I  think,  help  materially  to  explain  the  success  of 
Josiah's  reformation,  as  it  would  also  remove  the  necessity  for  the 
ascription  of  any  fraud  or  delusion,  or  even  illusion,  to  those  who 
were  its  prominent  agents.  I  believe  it  would  also  explain  the 
Deuteronomic  colouring,  as  it  is  called,  which  is  found  in  other 
books.  Cheyne  speaks  of  "the  school  of  writers  formed  upon  the 
book  of  Deuteronomy — a  school  which  includes  historians,  poets, 
and  prophets,  and  without  which  the  Old  Testament  would  be 
deprived  of  some  of  its  most  valued  pages"  (p.  68).  It  is  not  so 
very  obvious  how  a  school  could  be  formed  upon  a  book.  A  book 
issuing  from  a  school  is  at  least  as  conceivable  ;  and  the  fact  that 
the  school  embraced  "  historians,  poets,  and  prophets,"  would  lead 
us  to  suppose  that  it  was  of  more  gradual  growth,  under  influences 
wider  and  more  fundamental  than  a  book.  Even  if  we  explain  the 
school  by  the  existence  of  the  book,  the  book  itself  has  to  be  ac- 
counted for,  wiih  characteristics  sufficient  to  give  rise  to  a  school. 

Note  XXIX.  p.  432.— The  linguistic  comparison  of  the  various 
books  or  sources  lies  quite  beyond  the  subject  which  I  set  before 
myself ;  and  I  have  already  indicated  my  doubts  whether  this  kind 
of  argument  goes  very  far  to  determine  the  actual  dates  of  the  com- 
positions, much  less  to  determine  the  order  of  historical  events.  The 
student  will  find  the  linguistic  peculiarities  of  the  Hexateuch  fully 
stated  in  Dillmann's  Commentaries  on  those  books,  and  in  his  sum- 
mary statement,  '  Ueber  die  Composition  des  Hexateuch '  at  the  close 


Notes.  517 

of  tlie  series.  Delitzsch's  new  Commentary  on  Genesis  also  takes 
note  of  them  ;  and  of  course,  in  Kuenen's  Hexateuch,  they  are  pro- 
duced in  detaiL  A  special  work  on  the  subject  is  Ryssel's  '  De  Elo- 
histse  Pentateuchici  Sermone'  (1878),  which  is  criticised  by  Kayser 
in  '  Jahrb.  fiir  Prot.  Tlieol.,'  1881.  Riehm  treated  the  subject  also  in 
*  Stud.  u.  Krit.,'  1872,  and  is  criticised  by  Wellhausen  in  Bleek's 
'  Einleitung,'  4te  Aufl.,  p.  173  ff.  There  is  a  discussion  by  Kloster- 
mann  of  the  relation  of  Ezekiel  to  the  law  of  holiness  (Levit.  xviii.- 
xxvi.)  in  'Zeitschr.  fiir  luth.  Theol.,'  1877.  Strack  gives  a  brief 
statement  of  a  conservative  view  in  Zockler's  'Handbuch'  (1883), 
vol.  i.  p.  138  ff.  ;  and  Giesebrecht  has  an  important  discussion  of  the 
subject  (Die  Sprachgebrauch  des  hexat.  Elohisten)  in  Stack's  'Zeitschr. 
fiir  Alttest.  Wissensch.,'  1881.  Ryssel,  who  has  been  much  criticised, 
concludes  that  it  cannot  be  asserted  that  the  Elohist  is  later  in  date 
than  the  exile.  Bredenkamp,  while  laying  less  stress  on  the  linguis- 
tic argument,  comes  also  to  the  conclusion  that  no  part  of  the  Elo- 
histic  Torah  was  produced  in  the  period  of  the  language  succeeding 
^lalachi ;  and  he  points  out,  in  particular,  the  contrasts  it  presents 
to  the  language  of  Ezekiel  (Gesetz.  u.  Proph.,  p.  17).  F.  E.  Konig, 
to  whom  I  have  acknowledged  my  indebtedness  in  these  pnges,  has  a 
special  treatise,  '  De  criticse  sacrse  argumento  e  linguce  legibus  repe- 
tito'  (1879) ;  and  he  gives  also  a  very  comprehensive  statement  of  the 
whole  question  as  to  the  order  and  relation  of  the  various  documents 
in  his  '  Offenbarungsbegriff  des  Alten  Testaments'  (1882),  vol.ii.  p. 
321  ff.  He  declares  himself  an  adherent  of  the  view  of  Reuss  and 
Graf  that  the  Priestly  Code  is  later  than  Ezekiel ;  yet  he  strenuously 
asserts  that  the  historical  order,  law  and  prophets,  is  to  be  main- 
tained, and  says  that  the  Grafian  hypothesis  does  not  involve  a  denial 
of  this  order.  His  own  position  is  that  Moses  received  a  veritably 
supernatural  revelation,  that  through  him  God  brought  Israel  in  a 
miraculous  manner  out  of  Egypt,  and  concluded  a  covenant  with 
Israel  at  Sinai,  where  the  foundations  were  laid  of  Israel's  ordinances 
for  religion,  morals,  worship,  and  daily  life  (p.  333).  As  to  the  ex- 
tent to  which  Konig  differs  from  the  prevailing  school,  it  may  be 
mentioned  that  he  defends  the  Mosaic  origin  of  the  tabernacle  (ibid.), 
and  holds  that  the  absence  of  mention  of  the  Great  Day  of  Atone- 
ment in  Nehemiah  is  no  proof  that  the  law  relating  to  that  institu- 
tion was  not  then  known  (p.  331).  The  laws  relating  to  worship 
which  he  regards  as  belonging  to  the  original  Mosaic  legislation  are, 
besides  the  prohibition  of  images  and  the  Sabbath  law  (which  are  in 
the  Decalogue  itself) :  the  erection  of  altars  wherever  God  recorded 


518  Notes. 

His  name,  along  witli  which,  however,  the  tent  or  tabernacle  as 
chief  sanctuary ;  a  priestly  tribe  of  Levi,  with  high  priest  at  its 
head  ;  offerings  of  animals  and  fruits,  as  burnt-offerings  and  thank- 
offerings  ;  the  Sabbath  ;  new  moon  ;  three  collective  festivals,  &c. 
(p.  347).  It  is  but  just  to  a  careful  worker  like  Konig  to  present 
this  enumeration  (and  the  "&c.  "  is  added  by  himself)  ;  for  the  con- 
clusion involved  in  regard  to  the  history  and  the  credibility  of  the 
documents  differs  widely  from  that  of  most  of  the  critical  writers 
whose  views  we  have  considered.  It  might  be  suggested  that  if 
Konig  is  willing  to  believe  in  the  antiquity  of  some  institutions  in 
regard  to  which  the  history  is  silent,  he  might  have  been  content  to 
accept  the  statements  of  tlie  priestly  writers  as  to  others.  At  all 
events,  if  all  the  institutions  he  mentions  are  Mosaic,  it  is  evident 
that  an  equally  ancient  terminology  and  diction  must  have  existed 
(in  priestly  circles  at  least)  in  regard  to  them.  But,  as  I  have 
already  indicated,  I  cannot  profess  to  have  arrived  at  any  certainty 
on  such  matters,  and  therefore  do  not  hazard  conjecture  on  the 
subject. 

Note  XXX.  p.  435. — One  or  two  instances  of  this  style  of  proof 
may  be  given — it  is  evident  that  it  may  be  carried  to  any  length  : 
(a)  The  cities  of  refuge  are  not  of  early  institution,  but  the  law  in 
regard  to  them  arose  out  of  the  old  Banioth.  That  is  to  say,  an  altar 
used  to  be  a  place  of  asylum,  but  when  a  multiplicity  of  altars  was 
abolished  something  had  to  come  in  their  place.  (See  Well.,  Hist , 
pp.  161-163.)  Places  thus  set  apart  formed  the  germ  of  the  idea  of 
Levitical  cities,  and  the  compilers  of  the  Priestly  Code  went  on  in 
their  usual  way  to  trace  them  back  to  Moses,  imagining  a  condition 
of  things  neither  known  nor  workable  in  their  own  days.  (6)  In 
Deut.  there  are  references  to  the  monarchy,  but  none  in  the  Priestly 
Code.  The  conclusion  that  used  to  be  drawn  was  that  the  Priestly 
Code  was  older  than  the  monarchy.  On  Wellhausen's  theory,  how- 
ever, that  the  historical  sphere  of  the  Priestly  Code  is  one  "  created  by 
itself  out  of  its  own  legal  premises"  (p.  39),  the  silence  as  to  a  king 
is  explicable  by  the  fact  that  it  belongs  to  a  time  when  the  monarchy 
had  disappeared,  and  the  high  priest  was  the  chief  magistrate. 
The  so-called  theocracy  of  the  pre-monarchical  period  is  just,  in  short, 
a  reading  backward  into  history  of  the  hierocracy  of  post-exilian 
times — p.  148  ff.  (c)  According  to  Exod.  xxx.  the  expenses  of  the 
Temple  worship  are  met  directly  out  of  the  poll-tax  levied  from  the 
community,  which  can  only  be  explained  by  the  fact  that  at  that 


Notes.  519 

time  there  had  ceased  to  1)6  any  sovereign — p.  80.  {d)  "  One  might 
perhaps  hazard  the  conjecture  that  if  in  the  wilderness  legislation  of 
the  [Levitical]  Code  there  is  no  trace  of  agriculture  being  regarded 
as  the  basis  of  life,  which  it  still  is  in  Deut.  and  even  in  the  kernel 
of  Levit.  xvii.-xxvi.,  this  also  is  a  proof  that  the  Code  belongs  to  a 
very  recent  rather  than  to  a  very  early  period,  when  agriculture  was  no 
longer  rather  than  not  yet.  With  the  Babylonian  captivity  the  Jews 
lost  their  fixed  seats,  and  so  became  a  trading  people  " — p.  108. 

Note  XXXI.  p.  465. — T  have  purposely  avoided  making  any  refer- 
ence to  the  book  of  Joel,  although  much  might  be  said  in  favour  of 
its  pre-exilic  and  early  date.  I  will  not  say  that  it  is  on  account  of 
their  theory  of  the  late  origin  of  the  Priestly  Code  that  most  of  the 
modern  critics  relegate  this  book  to  post-exilic  times,  or  even  that  the 
theory  in  question,  taken  strictly,  requires  this.  Yet,  seeing  that  the 
date  of  the  book  is  so  much  disputed,  and  that  so  much,  if  anything 
at  all,  would  have  to  be  said  on  the  subject,  I  prefer  to  leave  it  alto- 
gether out  of  account,  as  I  have  practically  done  in  regard  to  the 
Psalter. 

Note  XXXII.  p.  469. — It  may  be  thought  that  I  have  given  more 
importance  than  their  views  demand  to  the  small  school  represented 
by  M.  Vernes,  and  also  that  the  extreme  positions  of  Daumer  and 
Ghillany  are  not  worthy  of  consideration  at  the  present  time.  It  is, 
however,  to  be  noted  that  many  of  the  views  of  these  older  writers 
are  put  forth  by  modern  critics,  and  on  the  same  grounds  ;  and  it  is 
but  fair  to  M.  Vernes  to  say  that  his  chief  objection  to  the  prevailing 
school  is  that  their  method  is  insufficient.  He  professes  to  carry  out 
to  their  legitimate  conclusion  the  principles  on  which  they  proceed  ; 
and  if,  as  it  seems  to  me,  the  critical  "circles"  to  which  Wellhausen 
refers  (Hist.,  p.  9)  are  concentric,  we  are  entitled  to  look  at  the  oper- 
ation of  central  principles.  It  may  not  be  agreeable  to  the  prevail- 
ing school  to  be  called  traditionalists  ;  yet  M.  Vernes  has  some  right 
to  ask,  if  the  recollection  of  the  period  immediately  preceding  Saul 
and  David  has  almost  completely  disappeared,  how  any  one  can  be 
justified  in  going  back  centuries  beyond  that  dim  period,  and  talking 
of  migrations  of  pre-Abrahamic  peoples  and  suchlike  matters  which 
are  shrouded  in  impenetrable  darkness  (Resultats,  &c.,  p.  42  f.)  So 
it  seems  to  me  he  is  only  carrying  out  the  principles  of  the  prevail- 
ing school  when  he  points  out  that  the  (so-called)  pre-exilic  prophets 
have  the  exile,  the  restoration,  and  the  spread  of  religion  among 


520  Notes. 

the  heathen  so  clearly  in  their  view,  that  the  books  must  have  been 
written  after  these  events  had  happened  or  become  possible  (p.  213  ff.) 
Scepticism  must  always  be  prepared  to  meet  scepticism  ;  and  when 
critics  triumphantly  tell  us  that  Amos  declares  that  the  Israelites 
did  not  sacrifice  in  the  wilderness,  and  Jeremiah  informs  us  dis- 
tinctly that  God  never  commanded  sacrifice,  and  therefore  the  con- 
troversy as  to  the  early  legislation  on  that  subject  is  ended,  it  is 
always  open  to  the  objector  to  ask  what  information  Amos  or  Jere- 
miah had  about  times  so  remote  that  was  not  possessed  by  their  con- 
temporaries. Again,  Daumer  claims  to  be  consistent  and  thorough  ; 
for  he  not  only  proves  the  original  fire  and  Moloch  worship  of  Israel 
from  the  same  texts  that  Kuenen  relies  upon,  but  concludes,  from  a 
passage  of  similar  tenor  in  Jeremiah  (xlvi.  10  ;  comp.  Isa.  xxxiv. 
6  ff.))  that  this  was  to  the  last  a  recognised  legal  service  (Feuer  und 
Molochdienst,  p.  25).  Not  without  reason  M.  Vernes  says  (Pref.,  p. 
iii),  "If  erudition  is  an  excellent  and  indispensable  thing,  it  can- 
not take  the  place  of  method."  Prof.  Briggs  tells  us  that  "higher 
criticism  is  exact  and  thorough  in  its  methods"  (Bib.  Study,  p.  194). 
I  can  perceive  the  thoroughness  ;  the  exactness  is  not  so  apparent. 


INDEX, 


Abir,  AhUr,  188,  220. 

Abraham,  25,  480— a  "free  creation," 

125,  501 — liis  offering  of  Isaac,  253 

— intercession  for  Sodom,  254. 
Adoii,  172,  187,  2i3. 
Agag,  262. 
Agriculture  learned  from  Canaanites, 

363— basis  of  feasts,  3J6  If.,  372  ff., 

401. 
Allah,  174,  305. 

Alluvial  deposit  on  tradition,  142. 
Alphabet,  78. 
Altar,  horns  of,  228— in  Egypt,  237— 

one,  411  tf. 
Amos,  53,  56  f.— style,  58,  61,  67— 

and  the  prophets,  86,  90,  154 — and 

local  cult,  213— and  the  calves,  228 

— and  the,  wilderness  period,  258  f. , 

507    f.  —  geographical    knowledge, 

510. 
Ancestors,  mythical,.  128  —  national, 

130— worship,  202. 
Animism,  199,  211  ff. 
Anthropomorphisms,  294, 
Apis,  188,  217  f. 

Apostasy  of  Israel,  29,  113,  148,  161. 
Appellative  names,  171,  181,  183,  509. 
Ark,  sacred,  203 — abode  of  deity,  222 

— its  place,  224 — in  time  of  Judges, 

346  f. 
Asherim,  235. 
Assyrian  polytheism,  181 — bulls,  219 

—period,  316  ft". 
Astarte,  176,  241,  299. 
Astuads,  270. 
Atonement,  Day  of,  397. 

Baal,  Baalim,  170  ff.,  226,  282,  305, 

501  f. 
Babylonian  deities,  176  ff.,  181  ff.— 

influence  on  Palestine,  182. 


Bamoth.     See  High  places. 
Bannockburn,  119,  134. 
Basket  of  fruits,  368. 
Bedawin  songs,  79 — tribes,  207. 
Belief  and  practice,  160,  328. 
Bona  fides,  48,  425,  437. 
Books  of  Old  Testament,  39,  43  ff., 
107  f.,  138,  142  f.,  332  f. 

Calf-worship,  215  ff. 

Canaanite  numina,  199. 

Canonical  writings,  139. 

Caricature,  87,  89, 

Carlyle  and  St  Edmund,  104,  132. 

Centralisation  of  worship,  327,  364, 

369  ff.,  449. 
Character  of  Jahaveh,  299,  306,  310, 

318,  321  ff-. 
Chemosh,  153,  213,  300,  303. 
Cherubim,  222. 
Chronicles,    book    of,    28,    93,    141, 

402. 
Circumcision,  249,  335. 
Clean  and  unclean,  348. 
Codes,  Coditication,  383  ff.,  388,  391, 

394. 
Commandment,  First,  303. 
"  Congregation,"  410. 
Contemporary  writings,  46,  51  f. 
Copyright,  479. 
Covenant,  the,  25,  29, 114,  313,  338  f., 

409,  453  f.,  509  f. 
Covenant,  book  of,  54,  62,  332,  350, 

358,  369,  373,  378,  383,  387,  389  ft", 

443,  454,  456 — and  place  of  worship, 

407  ff. 
Crusaders  and  topography,  98. 
Cumulative  evidence,  263. 

Dada,  Dodo,  &c.,  177  ff.,  181. 
Dan  worship,  233,  347. 


522 


Ijidex. 


David,  his  times,  81  —  serving  other 

gods,  195— and  music,  93,  506  f.— 

ephod,  231— his  house,  HI  f.,  146. 
Dawn  myth,  504  fF. 
Deborah's  song,  62,  118  f.,  133,  193, 

212. 
Decalogue,  70,  221  f.,  336,  410. 
Dervishes,  89. 
Deuteronomic    Code,   140,   332,   383, 

387,  393,  399,  426,  461. 
Deuteronomy,   195  if.,   417,   420  flf., 

515  f. 
Development,   34  f.,   158,   264,  294, 

301  f.,  325,  334,  404,  425  f.,  471, 

480  If.— prophetic,  144,  319. 
Discipline,  Book  of,  337  f. 
Discolouring  of  history,  31,  33,  39, 

92,  116  f.,  147,  157.     See  Alluvial, 

Redaction. 
Discredited  testimony,  149,  302,  319, 

347,  467. 
Documents,  private,  479.   See  Sources. 
Dreams,  210. 

"  Earlier  prophets,"  books  so  named, 

96. 
Ebal  and  Gerizim,  410. 
Ecclesiastes,  420  f 
Education  in  Israel,  75. 
Egypt,  altar  in,  237 — civilisation  and 

ritual,  336 -Israel  in,  287,  511  f. 
El,  187,  243,  278,  282  — Elim,   203, 

284,  289. 
Elegy,  62. 
Elijah,  53,  61— and  prophets,  84,  154 

— and  calves,   225  f. — at  Sarepta, 

291— at  Carmel,  100,  305. 
Elisha,  53,  61— and  prophets,  84  f.— 

and  calves,  225. 
Elohim,  172,  243,  284,  502. 
Elyon,  243. 
Ephod,  229  ff.,  238  flf. 
Eshmun,  176,  186. 
Ethic  monotheism,  155,  302  if.,  314, 

409.    See  Character. 
Evil  ascribed  to  God,  293. 
Exile,  the,  429,  433. 
Exodus,  the,  77,  HO  f.,  194,  217,  288, 

376  f.,  379. 
Ezekiel,  200,  208,  217,  335,  384,  397  f., 

427,  430  ff.,  452. 
Ezra,  382,  385,  398,  433,  457,  482. 

Feasts,  cycle,  372  AT.,  401— historical 
reference,  375.     See  Agriculture. 

Fetishism,  169,  199,  210  ff. 

Fiction,  legal.  420  —  historical,  424, 
434  ff.,  468  f. 


Fire-worship,  241  ff. 
First-born,  249  ff. 
Fountains,  sacred,  202. 

Genealogies,  80,  123  ff.,  499. 

Gibeonites,  262. 

Gideon's  ephod,  230  f. 

Grace  as  a  divine  attribute,  323. 

Graf,  395,  415  f.,  417  ff.,  466. 

Hadad,  177. 

Haggai,  361,  434,  459. 

Heine  and  Renan,  494. 

Hezekiah's  reform,  235  f.,  370,  457. 

High  places,  201,  248,  403  ff.,  450. 

History  not  annals,  36 — in  guise  of 
legend,  123 — study  of,  92 — writing 
of,  61  f.  —  periods  of,  131  —  and 
archaeology,  133.  See  Discolouring, 
Manufacture. 

Holiness  in  Jahaveh's  character,  309 
f.  —  law  of,  383  —  in  the  law, 
458. 

Homer  and  writing,  64. 

Hosea,  53,  57— style,  58,  61,  &7,  512 
— and  the  calves,  227 — and  written 
law,  342  ff.,  392— and  sacrifices,  344, 
446— and  history,  148  f. 

Hosts,  Lord  of,  182,  503  f. 

Image-worship,  223  f.,  308. 
Indirect  speech,  422  ff. 
Inspiration,  4b9  f. 
Interpolations  in  Amos  and  Hosea, 

147. 
Isaac,  legend  of,  125. 
Isaiah  and  God's  dwelling-place,  213 

f. — and  ritual,  443  f. — and  Bamoth, 

450. 
Israel  and  Judah,  514. 

Jacob,  the  name,  180 — at  Bethel,  198. 

Jashar,  book  of,  61  f.,  67,  81. 

Jau,  Babylonian  deity,  271. 

Jealousy,  divine,  298. 

Jehovah,  pronunciation  of,  32— signi- 
fication, 281  ff. 

Jephthah,  255  f.— and  Chemosh,  303. 

Jeremiah  and  sacrifice,  448 — incon- 
sistency, 451  f. 

Jeroboam's  calves,  219. 

Joel,  book  of,  519. 

Joh,  moon-god,  272  f. 

Joseph,  the  name,  180  f. 

Josiah,  371,  408,  427,  447,  455. 

Joyousness  of  worship,  366,  371  f. 

Judges,  book  of,  54, 116,  346 — period, 
133  f.,  233,  346. 


Index. 


523 


Kenites.  274. 

Kings,  books  of,  5'?,  116. 

Konig,  F.  E.,  his  critical  position,  517. 

Lang,  Andrew,  3,  189, 

Language,  imperfection  of,  304   f. — 

and  the  dates  of  documents,  493  f., 

516  f. 
Law,   codes  and   Looks,   331 — moral 

and  ceremonial,  458 — and  Gospel, 

463.     See  Modification,  Torah. 
Legalism.     See  ProjDhets. 
Legend,  123,  129  f. 
Levites,  349  f.,  360,  452. 
Levitical  Code,  346,  361,  383,  386  f., 

393,  417,  427  tf.,  436.    See  Priestly. 
Literary  age,, 61,  63  f. 
Literature,  early,  16 — specified,  53 — 

characterised,  57  fi". — of  India,  80. 
Localising  of  Deity,  206,  209. 
Love,  divine,  323. 

Ma?9ebas,  203,  235. 

Malachi,  361,  460. 

Manufacture  of  history,  435,  518  f. 

Mazzoth,  378  f. 

Memory,  feats  of,  80. 

Messianic  idea,  116,  499. 

Metaphorical  language,  188  fl'.,  207  f., 

213,  246,  264. 
Micah  and  images,  236 — and  off'erings, 

260  f.,  445. 
Micah's  ephod,  231  f. 
Might,  divine,  306. 
Missions,  modern,  65  f. 
Moabite  king,  256  f.,  300— stone,  178. 
Modification  of  laws  and  institutions, 

384  if.,  425,  437  ff. 
Mohammedanism,  18  f.,  35,  329,  470, 

485. 
Moloch,  153,  178,  187,  241  ff.,  282, 

300. 
Monolatry    and     Monotheism,     302, 

508  f. 
Monotheism,    nascent,    320    f. — and 

unity  of  worship,  327.     See  Ethic. 
Montenegrin  songs,  79. 
Mosaism,  159,  220,  495  f. 
Moses,  the  name,  179 — and  Jahaveh's 

character,  299  f.,  325 — laws  ascribed 

to,   335   If.— his  times,  337,  495— 

little  mentioned,  350  f. — deciding 

cases,  359— his  grandson,  233,  347. 
Mythology,   187,    299,   504    ff.      See 

Legend. 

Nature  feasts,  329,  363— God,  210. 
Nazirites,  71,  113. 


Nebiim,  87,  90,  154,  363. 

Nebo,  177,  179. 

Nebular  hypothesis  of  history,  131. 

Newman,  F.  W.,  485. 

Nomad  life,  1-26. 

Nuk  pu  oiu/c,  273, 

Numina,  199,  243,  304. 

Observances,  religious,  107  f. — signifi- 
cance, 329,  459. 

Omnipotence  and  onmipresence,  292, 
409. 

Omri,  house  of,  82,  511. 

Oral  transmission,  80.     See  Torah. 

Oratory  and  literary  activity,  63. 

Palestine,  12— exploration,  98,  102— 
Jahaveh's  house,  195,  367. 

Passover,  377  ff.,  385,  401. 

Patriarchal  stories,  53,  61,  104  f.,  120 
ff.,  205  f. — religion,  287 — worship, 
406. 

Paul,  St,  and  law,  340. 

Pentateuch,  traditional  authorship, 
43  ff.,  382 — anonymous,  332— legis- 
lation, 381  ff.— criticism,  386  f.— 
narratives,  417  ff. 

Pentaur,  poem,  77. 

Pesach,  378  f. 

Philistine  wars,  94,  204,  315. 

Philosophy  of  history,  115. 

Phraseology,  religious,  65,  68  f. 

Political  events,  315  f. 

Polytheism  in  Israel,  16^,  302. 

Popular  religion,  161,  311.  See  Pro- 
phetic. 

Praxis,  361,  399  ff ,  428,  442. 

Priestly  Code,  141,  332,  371,  375,  400 
ff.,  411,  429.     See  Levitical. 

Priests  as  educators,  105  —  acting 
with  prophets,  461. 

Primitive  ])eoples  and  conceptions, 
207,  214,  247,  483,  487. 

Programme,  337,  399  f. 

Prophetic  and  pre-prophetic,  52,  72, 
165,  169,  297— and  popular,  154, 
158,  307  ff.,  314  ff.,  323,  454— devel- 
opment, 163. 

Prophets  referred  to  by  Amos  and 
Hosea,  71  —  background  of,  73  — 
false,  144  f.— ".schools"  of,  83  ff.— 
literary  activity,  94— guardians  of 
tradition,  96 — destroyers  of  old  re- 
ligion, 310— and  legalism,  448  ff., 
463 — acting  with  priests,  461. 

Psalms  and  law,  345— and  criticism, 
474. 

Pseudonymous  literature,  420  ff. 


524 


Index. 


Quotations.     See  References. 

Redaction,  139-142. 

References  and  quotations,  108,  339  f. 

Reformers  or  originators,  68,  71,  156 
—  before  Josiali,  4J7. 

Religion  of  Israel,  15,  16  f.,  21  f.,  24, 
28— pre- Mosaic,  206,  284— ideal  and 
actual,  160,  308 -missionary,  19— 
universal,  311  —  heart  of,  473— in 
old  Israel,  475.  See  Patriarchal, 
Popular,  Prophetic,  Prophets. 

Remnant,  the,  115  f. 

Renau,  1.53,  189,  197,  243,  483,  490  f., 
494. 

Restoration,  the,  457.     See  Exile. 

Revelation,  462. 

Review^s  or  summaries,  54, 116  f.,  149. 

Rinimon,  177. 

Roeh,  88,  90.     See  Nebiim. 

Romance,  126  f. 

Sabbath,  335,  396. 

Sacrifice,  ancient,  335 — human,   see 

First-boru. 
Salmsezab,  197,  300. 
Samuel,  81,  83,  91,  446  f.— book  of, 

54,  346,  367. 
Sanctuaries,    local,    199,    201,    409— 

many,  405  ff. 
Saturn  worship,  258. 
Saul,  name  of,  179. 
Schleiermacher,  35. 
Shaddai,  243,  282. 
Shiloh,  346,  407,  411  f. 
Sifting  of  tradition,    143,    467.     See 

Discolouring. 
Silence,  argument  from,  395. 
Sinai,  name,  177, 179— God's  dwelling, 

193. 
Socin  and  exploration,  102  f. 
Solomon,  time  of,  81  f.— the  name, 

179,  181. 
Songs,  transmission  of,  60  f.,  79. 
"Sources,"  53,  496,  513— free  hand- 
ling of,  205,  467. 
Speeches,  422.     See  Indirect. 
Statutes,  341  f.,  359,  362. 
Style  of  O.T.  narrative,  424. 
Stones,  sacred,  203. 
Summaries.     See  Reviews. 


Sun  myth,  186 -god,  245. 

Symbols  to  denote  writers,  56,  478  ff., 

497. 
Syncretism,  173  f. 

Tabernacle,  217,  409,  411  f.,  517. 
Tabernacles,  feast  of  401. 
Talmud,  24,  482,  496. 
Tell-el-Amarna,  77,  79,  133. 
Temple,  the,  393, 400, 406,412, 428, 447. 
Teraphim,  219,  238  f. 
Testimony  of  a  nation,  72  f.,  109, 135, 

279. 
Theophanies,  200,  408. 
Theopneust,  156,  314. 
Thoreau  on  history,  37,  132. 
Thunder,  Thunderer,  209,  281  f.,  286 

f.,  314. 
Topogra]thical  accuracy,  97  ff. 
Torah,   341— oral,  354— priestly  and 

prophetic,  354  ff.,  441  ff.— Ijook  of, 

415  ff.— Toroth,  343,  392,  441. 
"Traditional"  view,  35,  43  f.,  382, 

465,  495. 
Trees,  sacred,  202. 
Tribes,  formation,  202,  499  f.— Greek, 

&c.,  207— tribal  god,  290. 
Tutelary  gods,  196. 

Underground  criticism,  4,  103,  127. 
Urim  and  Thummim,  218,  355. 

Vassalage,  367  f. 

Vernes,  Maurice,  101,  122,  127,  151, 
193,  397,  469,  519  f. 

Wars  of  Jahaveh,  book  of,  61  f.,  67, 
81   298. 

Weeks,  feast  of,  401. 

Wilderness  period,  377.  See  Amos, 
Exodus. 

World,  popular  and  prophetic  con- 
ception of,  293,  310,  316  f. 

Worship  and  daily  life,  365 — place  of, 
403  ff. 

Writer  and  his  age,  52,  152. 

Writing  on  stone,  64 — in  Israel,  75  — 
in  Egypt  and  East,  77,  498  —  in 
Moses'  time,  77,  81. 

Zechariah,  459. 


UNIVEBSITY  OP  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 
BERKELEY  "«ARY, 


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